THE ROUGH RIDERS 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 



BY 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

COLONEL OF THE FIRST UNITED STATES VOLUNTEER CAVALRY 



ILLUSTRATED 



CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
NEW YORK 1899 






Cofy;rtgbt, iSgp, hy 
Charles Scribner's Sons 

'WO COPIES RECEIVED, 



T»OW OIRECTOBY 

PRINTING AND aoOKBINDrNO COMPANY 

N€W YORK 



S C> o 2> 



ON BEHALF OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 

I DEDICATE THIS BOOK 

TO THE OFFICERS AND MEN OF THE 

FIVE REGULAR REGIMENTS 

WHICH TOGETHER WITH MINE MADE UP THE 

CAVALRY DIVISION AT SANTIAGO 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

EXECUTIVE MANSION 
ALBANY, N. Y., MAY 1 

1S99 



CONTENTS 

I'AOK 

^ I. RAISING THE REGIMENT i 

' IJ. TO CUHA 39 

ill. GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT AT 1,AS 

GUASIMAS 73 

IV. THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO . . .113 

V. IN THE TRENCHES 160 

VI. Till': Rl'.TURN HOME 199 

APPENDICES : 

A. Miistcr-Out Roll 23S 

B. Colonel Roosevelt's Report to tlie Seeretary of 

War oi September loth 270 

C. The '* Roiiiul Roliiii " Letter z8o 

D. Correetions 284 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



Colonel Theodore Roosevelt .... Frontispiece 

{Pliotogravu7e fro7>i Photograph by Rockwood.) 



FACING 
PAGE 



Colonel Leonard Wood . 

Regimental Drill of the Rough 
Texas 



Riders at San Antonio, 



Captain Bucky CN-il. . 
Captain Allyn Capron 
Five Bronco-Busters 
Troop K, Rough Riders 
Colonel Roosevelt . 

(Drawing by C. D. Gibson.) 

Chaplain Brown Preaching to the Regiment 

Troop H, shortly after Arrival at Tampa . 

Scene on the Dock at Port Tampa on the Day of 
Sailing of the Transports ..... 

Transport No. 8 — Yucatan, with Rough Riders on 
Board, off for Cuba ..... 

General View of the Landing at Daiquiri — Transports 
in the Offing ....... 



8 
i6 
i6 
26 

34 
38 

54 
56 

60 

64 

70 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



FACING 
PAGE 



Another View of the Landing at Daiquiri . . .72 

Rough Riders' Camp at Daiquiri . . . > 1^ 

Brigadier- General S. B. M. Young . . . .80 

Opening at Side of Road through which Left Flank of 

Rough Riders Deployed . . . . .88 

Hamilton Fish, Jr., First Sergeant, Troop L . -94 

Major Brodie ....... 96 

Camp of the Rough Riders after the Guasimas Fight . 104 

Helping a Wounded Rough Rider to the Rear after 

the Guasimas Fight . . . . . .106 

The Spot where Seven Rough Riders were Buried after 

the First Day's Fight at Las Guasimas . .108 

General Sumner, who Commanded the Cavalry Division 

During the San Juan Fight . . . .116 

Rough Riders Fording the San Juan River while moving 

to the Front . . . . . . . i 20 

Litde Texas — Colonel Roosevelt's War Horse . .128 

Charge of the Rough Riders at San Juan Hill . .132 

(From the Painting by Frederic Remington.) 

View from San Juan Hill of first Hill and Block-house 

Captured on the First of July . . . .140 

Lieutenants J. Mcllhenny, Horace K. Devereux, S. 

Coleman, W. E. Dame . . . . .146 

X 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



FACING 
PAGE 



Men Recommended for Promotion for Gallantry in 

Action . . . . • . • • 152 

Captain Woodbury Kane .... 

William Pollock (Pawnee Indian) . . : 

Rough Riders in the Trenches .... 

Colonel Roosevelt and Rough Riders at the Point where 
they Charged over the Hill at San Juan 

View of San Juan Hill and Block-house, showing the 
Camp of the United States Forces 

A Consultation at General Wheeler's Head-quarters 
Bomb-proofs behind the Main Trenches before Santiago 190 
Sergeant Guitilias, a Veteran of the Civil War . 
Trooper Morrison, formerly a Baptist Minister 
Colonel Roosevelt Visiting Colonel Turner, of the First 
Illinois Regiment, U. S. V. 

The Rough Riders at Camp Wikoff . 
Sergeant Darnell Rides the Third Cavalry Bucker 
McGinty on a Bronco ..... 
Color-Sergeant A. P. Wright .... 
Colonel Roosevelt's Farewell to the Rough Riders 



154 

154 
i6z 

168 

180 
188 



194 
194 

196 
220 
226 
226 

228 
234 



*^* The design on the front cover is a facsimile of the bronze 
medal struck for each member of the regifnent. 



Hark ! I hear the tramp of thousands. 

And of armed men the hum ; 

Lo ! a nation's hosts have gathered 

Round the quick-alarming drum — 

Saying, " Come, 

Freemen, come ! 

Ere your heritage be wasted," said the quick-alarming drum. 

*' Let me of my heart take counsel : 

War is not of Life the sum ; 
Who shall stay and reap the harvest 
When the autumn days shall come?" 
But the drum 
Echoed, "Come ! 
Death shall reap the braver harvest," said the solemn-sound- 
ing drum. 

** But when won the coming battle. 
What of profit springs therefrom ? 
What if conquest, subjugation. 
Even greater ills become?" 
But the drum 
Answered, ** Come ! 
You must do the sum to prove it," said the Yankee-answer- 
ing drum. 

—BRET HARTE. 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

DURING the year preceding the outbreak of 
the Spanish War I was Assistant Secre- 
tary of the Navy. While my party was in oppo- 
sition, I had preached, with all the fervor and zeal 
I possessed, our duty to intervene in Cuba, and 
to take this opportunity of driving the Spaniard 
from the Western World. Now that my party 
had come to power, I felt it incumbent on me, 
by word and deed, to do all I could to secure the 
carrying out of the policy in which I so heartily 
believed; and from the beginning I had deter- 
mined that, if a war came, somehow or other, I 
was going to the front. 

Meanwhile, there was any amount of work at 
hand in getting ready the navy, and to this I de- 
voted myself. 

Naturally, when one is intensely interested in a 
certain cause, the tendency is to associate particu- 



:,^^\ 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

larly with those who take the same view. A 
large number of my friends felt very differently 
from the way I felt, and looked upon the possi- 
bility of war with sincere horror. But I found 
plenty of sympathizers, especially in the navy, the 
army, and the Senate Committee on Foreign Af- 
fairs. Commodore Dewey, Captain Evans, Cap- 
tain Brownson, Captain Davis — with these and 
the various other naval officers on duty at Wash- 
ington I used to hold long consultations, during 
which we went over and over, not only every 
question of naval administration, but specifically 
everything necessary to do in order to put the 
navy in trim to strike quick and hard if, as we 
believed would be the case, we went to war with 
Spain. Sending an ample quantity of ammunition 
to the Asiatic squadron and providing it with coal ; 
getting the battle-ships and the armored cruisers 
on the Atlantic into one squadron, both to train 
them in manoeuvring together, and to have them 
ready to sail against either the Cuban or the Span- 
ish coasts ; gathering the torpedo-boats into a flo- 
tilla for practice ; securing ample target exercise, 
so conducted as to raise the standard of our marks- 
manship ; gathering in the small ships from Eu- 
ropean and South American waters; settling on 
the number and kind of craft needed as auxiliary 
cruisers — every one of these points was threshed 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

over in conversations with officers who were pres- 
ent in Washington, or in correspondence with of- 
ficers who, like Captain Mahan, were absent. 

As for the Senators, of course Senator Lodge 
and I felt precisely alike ; for to fight in such a 
cause and with such an enemy was merely to carry 
out the doctrines we had both of us preached for 
many years. Senator Davis, Senator Proctor, 
Senator Foraker, Senator Chandler, Senator Mor- 
gan, Senator Frye, and a number of others also 
took just the right ground ; and I saw a great deal 
of them, as well as of many members of the House, 
particularly those from the West, where the feel- 
ing for war was strongest. 

Naval officers came and went, and Senators 
were only in the city while the Senate was in ses- 
sion ; but there was one friend who was steadily 
in Washington. This was an army surgeon. Dr. 
Leonard Wood. I only met him after I entered 
the navy department, but we soon found that we 
had kindred tastes and kindred principles. He 
had served in General Miles's inconceivably har- 
assing campaigns against the Apaches, where he 
had displayed such courage that he won that most 
coveted of distinctions — the Medal of Honor; 
such extraordinary physical strength and endur- 
ance that he grew to be recognized as one of the 
two or three white men who could stand fatigue 

3 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

and hardship as well as an Apache; and such 
judgment that toward the close of the campaigns 
he was given, though a surgeon, the actual com- 
mand of more than one expedition against the 
bands of renegade Indians. Like so many of the 
gallant fighters with whom it was later my good 
fortune to serve, he combined, in a very high de- 
gree, the qualities of entire manliness with entire 
uprightness and cleanliness of character. It was 
a pleasure to deal with a man of high ideals, who 
scorned everything mean and base, and who also 
possessed those robust and hardy qualities of body 
and mind, for the lack of which no merely nega- 
tive virtue can ever atone. He was by nature a 
soldier of the highest type, and, like most natural 
soldiers, he was, of course, born with a keen long- 
ing for adventure ; and, though an excellent doc- 
tor, what he really desired was the chance to lead 
men in some kind of hazard. To every possibil- 
ity of such adventure he paid quick attention. 
For instance, he had a great desire to get me to 
go with him on an expedition into the Klondike 
in mid-winter, at the time when it was thought 
that a relief party would have to be sent there to 
help the starving miners. 

In the summer he and I took long walks to- 
gether through the beautiful broken country sur- 
rounding Washington. In winter we sometimes 

4 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

varied these walks by kicking a foot-ball in an 
empty lot, or, on the rare occasions when there 
was enough snow, by trying a couple of sets of 
skis or snow-skates, which had been sent me from 
Canada. 

But always on our way out to and back from 
these walks and sport, there was one topic to 
which, in our talking, we returned, and that was 
the possible war with Spain. We both felt very 
strongly that such a war would be as righteous as 
it would be advantageous to the honor and the 
interests of the nation ; and after the blowing up 
of the Maine, we felt that it was inevitable. We 
then at once began to try to see that we had our 
share in it. The President and my own chief, 
Secretary Long, were very firm against my going, 
but they said that if I was bent upon going they 
would help me. Wood was the medical adviser 
of both the President and the Secretary of War, 
and could count upon their friendship. So we 
started with the odds in our favor. 

At first we had great difficulty in knowing ex- 
actly what to try for. We could go on the staff 
of any one of several Generals, but we much pre- 
ferred to go in the line. Wood hoped he might 
get a commission in his native State of Massachu- 
setts ; but in Massachusetts, as in every other State, 
it proved there were ten men who wanted to go 

5 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

to the war for every chance to go. Then we 
thought we might get positions as field-officers 
under an old friend of mine, Colonel — now Gen- 
eral — Francis V. Greene, of New York, the Col- 
onel of the Seventy-first ; but again there were no 
vacancies. 

Our doubts were resolved when Congress au- 
thorized the raising of three cavalry regiments 
from among the wild riders and riflemen of the 
Rockies and the Great Plains. During Wood's 
service in the Southwest he had commanded not 
only regulars and Indian scouts, but also white 
frontiersmen. In the Northwest I had spent much 
of my time, for many years, either on my ranch 
or in long hunting trips, and had lived and worked 
for months together with the cow-boy and the 
mountain hunter, faring in every way precisely as 
they did. 

Secretary Alger offered me the command of 
one of these regiments. If I had taken it, being 
entirely inexperienced in military work, I should 
not have known how to get it equipped most 
rapidly, for I should have spent valuable weeks 
in learning its needs, with the result that I should 
have missed the Santiago campaign, and might 
not even have had the consolation prize of going 
to Porto Rico. Fortunately, I was wise enough 
to tell the Secretary that while I believed I could 



/ 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

learn to command the regiment in a month, yet 
that it was just this very month which I could 
not afford to spare, and that therefore I would be 
quite content to go as Lieutenant-Colonel, if he 
would make Wood Colonel. 

This was entirely satisfactory to both the Presi- 
dent and Secretary, and, accordingly, Wood and 
I were speedily commissioned as Colonel and 
Lieutenant-Colonel of the First United States 
Volunteer Cavalry. This was the official title 
of the regiment, but for some reason or other 
the public promptly christened us the "Rough 
Riders." At first we fought against the use of 
the term, but to no purpose; and when finally 
the Generals of Division and Brigade began to 
write in formal communications about our regi- 
ment as the "Rough Riders," we adopted the 
term ourselves. 

The mustering-places for the regiment were 
appointed in New Mexico, Arizona, Oklahoma, 
and Indian Territory. The difficulty in organiz- 
ing was not in selecting, but in rerectmg men. 
Within a day or two after it was announced that 
we were to raise the regiment, v/e were literally 
deluged with applications from every quarter of 
the Union. Without the slightest trouble, so far 
as men went, we could have raised a brigade or 
even a division. The difficulty lay in arming, 

7 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

equipping, mounting, and disciplining the men 
we selected. Hundreds of regiments were being 
called into existence by the National Govern- 
ment, and each regiment was sure to have innu- 
merable wants to be satisfied. To a man who 
knew the ground as Wood did, and who was 
entirely aware of our national unpreparedness, it 
was evident that the ordnance and quartermaster's 
bureaus could not meet, for some time to come, 
one-tenth of the demands that would be made 
upon them ; and it was all-important to get in first 
with our demands. Thanks to his knowledge of 
the situation and promptness, we immediately put 
in our requisitions for the articles indispensable 
for the equipment of the regiment ; and then, by 
ceaseless worrying of excellent bureaucrats, who 
had no idea how to do things quickly or how to 
meet an emergency, we succeeded in getting our 
rifles, cartridges, revolvers, clothing, shelter-tents, 
and horse gear just in time to enable us to go 
on the Santiago expedition. Some of the State 
troops, who were already organized as National 
Guards, were, of course, ready, after a fashion, 
when the war broke out; but no other regiment 
which had our work to do was able to do it in 
anything like as quick time, and therefore no 
other volunteer regiment saw anything like the 
fighting which we did. 

8 




Regimental Drill of tlie Rough 




Colonel Wood. 

Riders at San Antonio, Texas. 



Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt. 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

Wood thoroughly reahzed what the Ordnance 
Department failed to reahze, namely the inestima- 
ble advantage of smokeless powder; and, more- 
over, he was bent upon our having the weapons 
of the regulars, for this meant that we would be 
brigaded with them, and it was evident that they 
would do the bulk of the fighting if the war were 
short. Accordingly, by acting with the utmost 
vigor and promptness, he succeeded in getting 
our regiment armed with the Krag-Jorgensen 
carbine used by the regular cavalry. 

It was impossible to take any of the numerous 
companies which were proffered to us from the 
various States. The only organized bodies we 
were at liberty to accept were those from the four 
Territories. But owing to the fact that the num- 
ber of men originally allotted to us, 780, was 
speedily raised to 1,000, we were given a chance 
to accept quite a number of eager volunteers who 
did not come from the Territories, but who pos- 
sessed precisely the same temper that distin- 
guished our Southwestern recruits, and whose 
presence materially benefited the regiment. 

We drew recruits from Harvard, Yale, Prince- 
ton, and many another college; from clubs like 
the Somerset, of Boston, and Knickerbocker, of 
New York ; and from among the men who be- 
longed neither to club nor to college, but in 

9 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

whose veins the blood stirred with the same 
impulse which once sent the Vikings over sea. 
Four of the policemen who had served under me, 
while I was President of the New York Police 
Board, insisted on coming — two of them to die, 
the other two to return unhurt after honorable 
and dangerous service. It seemed to me that 
almost every friend I had in every State had some 
one acquaintance who was bound to go with the 
Rough Riders, and for whom I had to make a 
place. Thomas Nelson Page, General Fitzhugh 
Lee, Congressman Odell of New York, Senator 
Morgan ; for each of these, and for many others, 
I eventually consented to accept some one or two 
recruits, of course only after a most rigid exami- 
nation into their physical capacity, and after they 
had shown that they knew how to ride and shoot. 
I may add that in no case was I disappointed in 
the men thus taken. 

Harvard being my own college, I had such a 
swarm of applications from it that I could not 
take one in ten. What particularly pleased me, 
not only in the Harvard but the Yale and Prince- 
ton men, and, indeed, in these recruits from the 
older States generally, was that they did not ask 
for commissions. With hardly an exception they 
entered upon their duties as troopers in the spirit 
which they held to the end, merely endeavoring 

lO 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

to show that no work could be too hard, too dis- 
agreeable, or too dangerous for them to perform, 
and neither asking nor receiving any reward irt 
the way of promotion or consideration. The 
Harvard contingent was practically raised by Guy 
Murchie, of Maine. He saw all the fighting and 
did his duty with the utmost gallantry, and then 
left the service as he had entered it, a trooper, 
entirely satisfied to have done his duty — and no 
man did it better. So it was with Dudley Dean, 
perhaps the best quarterback who ever played on 
a Harvard Eleven ; and so with Bob Wrenn, a 
quarterback whose feats rivalled those of Dean's, 
and who, in addition, was the champion tennis 
player of America, and had, on two different 
years, saved this championship from going to an 
Englishman. So it was with Yale men like 
Waller, the high jumper, and Garrison and 
Girard ; and with Princeton men like Devereux 
and Channing, the foot-ball players ; with Lamed, 
the tennis player; with Craig Wadsworth, the 
steeple-chase rider; with Joe Stevens, the crack 
polo player ; with Hamilton Fish, the ex-captain 
of the Columbia crew, and with scores of others 
whose names are quite as worthy of mention as 
any of those I have given. Indeed, they all 
sought entry into the ranks of the Rough Riders 
as eagerly as if it meant something widely differ- 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ent from hard work, rough fare, and the possi- 
biUty of death ; and the reason why they turned 
out to be such good soldiers lay largely in the fact 
that they were men who had thoroughly counted 
the cost before entering, and who went into the 
regiment because they believed that this offered 
their best chance for seeing hard and dangerous 
service. Mason Mitchell, of New York, who had 
been a chief of scouts in the Riel Rebellion, 
travelled all the way to San Antonio to enlist; 
and others came there from distances as great. 

Some of them made appeals to me which I 
could not possibly resist Woodbury Kane had 
been a close friend of mine at Harvard. During 
the eighteen years that had passed since my grad- 
uation I had seen very little of him, though, being 
always interested in sport, I occasionally met him 
on the hunting field, had seen him on the deck of 
the Defender when she vanquished the Valkyrie, 
and knew the part he had played on the Navajoe, 
when, in her most important race, that otherwise 
unlucky yacht vanquished her opponent, the 
Prince of Wales's Britannia. When the war was 
on, Kane felt it his duty to fight for his country. 
He did not seek any position of distinction. All 
he desired was the chance to do whatever work he 
was put to do well, and to get to the front; and 
he enlisted as a trooper. When I went down to 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

the camp at San Antonio he was on kitchen duty, 
and was cooking and washing dishes for one of 
the New Mexican troops ; and he was doing it so 
well that I had no further doubt as to how he 
would get on. 

My friend of many hunts and ranch partner, 
Robert Munro Ferguson, of Scotland, who had 
been on Lord Aberdeen's staff as a Lieutenant but 
a year before, likewise could not keep out of the 
regiment. He, too, appealed to me in terms 
which I could not withstand, and came in like 
Kane to do his full duty as a trooper, and like 
Kane to win his commission by the way he thus 
did his duty. 

I felt many qualms at first in allowing men of 
this stamp to come in, for I could not be certain 
that they had counted the cost, and was afraid 
they would find it very hard to serve — not for a 
few days, but for months — in the ranks, while I, 
their former intimate associate, was a field-officer ; 
but they insisted that they knew their minds, and 
the events showed that they did. We enlisted 
about fifty of them from Virginia, Maryland, and 
the Northeastern States, at Washington. Before 
allowing them to be sworn in, I gathered them 
together and explained that if they went in they 
must be prepared not merely to fight, but to per- 
form the weary, monotonous labor incident to the 

13 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ordinary routine of a soldier's life; that they must 
be ready to face fever exactly as they were to face 
bullets ; that they were to obey unquestioningly, 
and to do their duty as readily if called upon to 
garrison a fort as if sent to the front. I warned 
them that work that was merely irksome and dis- 
agreeable must be faced as readily as work that 
was dangerous, and that no complaint of any kind 
must be made ; and I told them that they were 
entirely at liberty not to go, but that after they 
had once signed there could then be no backing 
out. 

Not a man of them backed out ; not one of 
them failed to do his whole duty. 

These men formed but a small fraction of the 
whole. They went down to San Antonio, where 
the regiment was to gather and where Wood pre- 
ceded me, while I spent a week in Washington 
hurrying up the different bureaus and telegraph- 
ing my various railroad friends, so as to insure 
our getting the carbines, saddles, and uniforms 
that we needed from the various armories and 
storehouses. Then I went down to San Antonio 
myself, where I found the men from New 
Mexico, Arizona, and Oklahoma already gath- 
ered, while those from Indian Territory came in 
soon after my arrival. 

These were the men who made up the bulk of 
14 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

the regiment, and gave it its peculiar character. 
They came from the Four Territories which yet i 

remained within the boundaries of the United 
States; that is, from the lands that have been 
most recently won over to white civilization, and 
in which the conditions of life are nearest those 
that obtained on the frontier when there still was 
a frontier. They were a splendid set of men, 
these Southwesterners — tall and sinewy, with reso- 
lute, weather-beaten faces, and eyes that looked a 
man straight in the face without flinching. They 
included in their ranks men of every occupation; 
but the three types were those of the cow-boy, the 
hunter, and the mining prospector — the man who 
wandered hither and thither, killing game for a 
living, and spending his life in the quest for 
metal wealth. 

In all the world there could be no better mate- 
rial for soldiers than that afforded by these grim 
hunters of the mountains, these wild rough riders 
of the plains. They were accustomed to han- 
dling wild and savage horses; they were accus- 
tomed to following the chase with the rifle, both 
for sport and as a means of livelihood. Varied 
though their occupations had been, almost all had, 
at one time or another, herded cattle and hunted 
big game. They were hardened to life in the 
open, and to shifting for themselves under adverse 

15 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

circumstances. They were used, for all their law- 
less freedom, to the rough discipline of the round- 
up and the mining company. Some of them 
came from the small frontier towns; but most 
were from the wilderness, having left their lonely 
hunters' cabins and shifting cow-camps to seek, 
new and more stirring adventures beyond the sea. 

They had their natural leaders — the men who 
had shown they could master other men, and 
could more than hold their own in the eager driv- 
ing life of the new settlements. 

The Captains and Lieutenants were sometimes 
men who had campaigned in the regular army 
against Apache, Ute, and Cheyenne, and who, on 
completing their term of service, had shown their 
energy by settling in the new communities and 
growing up to be men of mark. In other cases 
they were sheriffs, marshals, deputy-sheriffs and 
deputy-marshals — men who had fought Indians, 
and still more often had waged relentless war 
upon the bands of white desperadoes. There was 
Bucky O'Neill, of Arizona, Captain of Troop A, 
the Mayor of Prescott, a famous sheriff through- 
out the West for his feats of victorious warfare 
against the Apache, no less than against the white 
road-agents and man-killers. His father had 
fought in Meagher's Brigade in the Civil War; 
and he was himself a born soldier, a born leader 

i6 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

of men. He was a wild, reckless fellow, soft 
spoken, and of dauntless courage and boundless 
ambition; he was stanchly loyal to his friends, 
and cared for his men in every way. There was 
Captain Llewellen, of New Mexico, a good citi- 
zen, a political leader, and one of the most noted 
peace-officers of the country; he had been shot 
four times in pitched fights with red marauders 
and white outlaws. There was Lieutenant Bal- 
lard, who had broken up the Black Jack gang of 
ill-omened notoriety, and his Captain, Curry, 
another New Mexican sheriff of fame. The 
officers from the Indian Territory had almost all 
served as marshals and deputy-marshals ; and in 
the Indian Territory, service as a deputy-marshal 
meant capacity to fight stand-up battles with the 
gangs of outlaws. 

Three of our higher officers had been in the 
regular army. One was Major Alexander Brodie, 
from Arizona, afterward Lieutenant-Colonel, who 
had lived for twenty years in the Territory, and 
had become a thorough Westerner without sink- 
ing the West Pointer — a soldier by taste as well 
as training, whose men worshipped him and 
would follow him anywhere, as they would Bucky 
O'Neill or any other of their favorites. Brodie 
was running a big mining business; but when 
the Maine was blown up, he abandoned every- 

17 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

thing and telegraphed right and left to bid his 
friends get ready for the fight he saw impending. 

Then there was Micah Jenkins, the Captain of 
Troop K, a gentle and courteous South Carolin- 
ian, on whom danger acted like wine. In action 
he was a perfect game-cock, and he won his 
majority for gallantry in battle. 

Finally, there was Allyn Capron, who was, on 
the whole, the best soldier in the regiment. In 
fact, I think he was the ideal of what an Ameri- 
can regular army officer should be. He was the 
fifth in descent from father to son who had served 
in the army of the United States, and in body and 
mind alike he was fitted to play his part to per- 
fection. Tall and lithe, a remarkable boxer and 
walker, a first-class rider and shot, with yellow hair 
and piercing blue eyes, he looked what he was, 
the archetype of the fighting man. He had under 
him one of the two companies from the Indian 
Territory ; and he so soon impressed himself upon 
the wild spirit of his followers, that he got them 
ahead in discipline faster than any other troop in 
the regiment, while at the same time taking care 
of their bodily wants. His ceaseless effort was so 
to train them, care for them, and inspire them as 
to bring their fighting efficiency to the highest 
possible pitch. He required instant obedience, 
and tolerated not the slightest evasion of duty; 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

but his mastery of his art was so thorough and his 
performance of his own duty so rigid that he won 
at once not merely their admiration, but that sol- 
dierly affection so readily given by the man in the 
ranks to the superior who cares for his men and 
leads them fearlessly in battle. 

All — Easterners and Westerners, Northerners 
and Southerners, officers and men, cow-boys and 
college graduates, wherever they came from, and 
whatever their social position — possessed in com- 
mon the traits of hardihood and a thirst for advent- 
ure. They were to a man born adventurers, in 
the old sense of the word. 

The men in the ranks were mostly young; yet 
some were past their first youth. These had taken 
part in the killing of the great buffalo herds, and 
had fought Indians when the tribes were still on the 
war-path. The younger ones, too, had led rough 
lives ; and the lines in their faces told of many 
a hardship endured, and many a danger silently 
faced with grim, unconscious philosophy. Some 
were originally from the East, and had seen 
strange adventures in different kinds of life, from 
sailing round the Horn to mining in Alaska. 
Others had been born and bred in the West, and 
had never seen a larger town than Santa Fe or a 
bigger body of water than the Pecos in flood. 
Some of them went by their own name ; some had 

19 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

changed their names; and yet others possessed 
but half a name, colored by some adjective, like 
Cherokee Bill, Happy Jack of Arizona, Smoky 
Moore, the bronco-b aster, so named because cow- 
boys often call vicious horses "smoky" horses, 
and Rattlesnake Pete, who had lived among the 
Moquis and taken part in the snake -dances. 
Some were professional gamblers, and, on the 
other hand, no less than four were or had been 
Baptist or Methodist clergymen — and proved first- 
class fighters, too, by the way. Some were men 
whose lives in the past had not been free from the 
taint of those fierce kinds of crime into which the 
lawless spirits who dwell on the border-land be- 
tween civilization and savagery so readily drift. 
A far larger number had served at different times 
in those bodies of armed men with which the 
growing civilization of the border finally puts 
down its savagery. 

There was one characteristic and distinctive con- 
tingent which could have appeared only in such 
a regiment as ours. From the Indian Territory 
there came a number of Indians — Cherokees, 
Chickasaws, Choctaws, and Creeks. Only a few 
were of pure blood. The others shaded off until 
they were absolutely indistinguishable from their 
white comrades; with whom, it maybe mentioned, 
they all lived on terms of complete equality. 

20 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

Not all of the Indians were from the Indian 
Territory. One of the gamest fighters and best 
soldiers in the regiment was Pollock, a full- 
blooded Pawnee. He had been educated, like 
most of the other Indians, at one of those admira- 
ble Indian schools which have added so much to 
the total of the small credit account with which 
the White race balances the very unpleasant debit 
account of its dealings with the Red. Pollock 
was a silent, solitary fellow — an excellent pen- 
man, much given to drawing pictures. When 
we got down to Santiago he developed into the 
regimental clerk. I never suspected him of hav- 
ing a sense of humor until one day, at the end of 
our stay in Cuba, as he was sitting in the Adju- 
tant's tent working over the returns, there turned 
up a trooper of the First who had been acting as 
barber. Eying him with immovable face Pollock 
asked, in a guttural voice, "Do you cut hair*?" 
The man answered "Yes"; and Pollock contin- 
ued, "Then you'd better cut mine," muttering, 
in an explanatory soliloquy, " Don't want to wear 
my hair long like a wild Indian when I'm in civ- 
ilized warfare." 

Another Indian came from Texas. He was a 
brakeman on the Southern Pacific, and wrote 
telling me he was an American Indian, and that 
he wanted to enlist. His name was Colbert, 

21 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

which at once attracted my attention ; for I was 
familiar with the history of the Cherokees and 
Chickasaws during the eighteenth century, when 
they Hved east of the Mississippi. Early in that 
century various traders, chiefly Scotchmen, settled 
among them, and the half-breed descendants of 
one named Colbert became the most noted chiefs 
of the Chickasaws. I summoned the applicant 
before me, and found that he was an excellent 
man, and, as I had supposed, a descendant of the 
old Chickasaw chiefs. 

He brought into the regiment, by the way, his 
" partner," a white man. The two had been in- 
separable companions for some years, and con- 
tinued so in the regiment. Every man who has 
lived in the West knows that, vindictive though 
the hatred between the white man and the Indian 
is when they stand against one another in what 
may be called their tribal relations, yet that men of 
Indian blood, when adopted into white communi- 
ties, are usually treated precisely like anyone else. 

Colbert was not the only Indian whose name I 
recognized. There was a Cherokee named Adair, 
who, upon inquiry, I found to be descended from 
the man who, a century and a half ago, wrote a 
ponderous folio, to this day of great interest, about 
the Cherokees, with whom he had spent the best 
years of his life as a trader and agent. 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

I don't know that I ever came across a man 
with a really sweeter nature than another Chero- 
kee named Holderman. He was an excellent 
soldier, and for a long time acted as cook for the 
head-quarters mess. He was a half-breed, and 
came of a soldier stock on both sides and through 
both races. He explained to me once why he 
had come to the war ; that it was because his peo- 
ple always had fought when there was a war, and 
he could not feel happy to stay at home when the 
flag was going into battle. 

Two of the young Cherokee recruits came to 
me with a most kindly letter from one of the 
ladies who had been teaching in the academy 
from which they were about to graduate. She 
and I had known one another in connection with 
Governmental and philanthropic work on the res- 
ervations, and she wrote to commend the two 
boys to my attention. One was on the Academy 
foot-ball team and the other in the glee-club. 
Both were fine young fellows. The foot-ball 
player now lies buried with the other dead who 
fell in the fight at San Juan. The singer was 
brought to death's door by fever, but recovered 
and came back to his home. 

There were other Indians of much wilder type, 
but their wildness was precisely like that of the 
cow-boys with whom they were associated. One 

23 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

or two of them needed rough discipline ; and they 
got it, too. Like the rest of the regiment, they 
were splendid riders. I remember one man, whose 
character left much to be desired in some respects, 
but whose horsemanship was unexceptionable. 
He was mounted on an exceedingly bad bronco, 
which would bolt out of the ranks at drill. He 
broke it of this habit by the simple expedient of 
giving it two tremendous twists, first to one side 
and then to the other, as it bolted, with the result 
that, invariably, at the second bound its legs 
crossed and over it went with a smash, the rider 
taking the somersault with unmoved equanimity. 

The life histories of some of the men who 
joined our regiment would make many volumes 
of thrilling adventure. 

We drew a great many recruits from Texas ; 
and from nowhere did we get a higher average, 
for many of them had served in that famous body 
of frontier fighters, the Texas Rangers. Of course, 
these rangers needed no teaching. They were 
already trained to obey and to take responsibility. 
They were splendid shots, horsemen, and trailers. 
They were accustomed to living in the open, to 
enduring great fatigue and hardship, and to en- 
countering all kinds of danger. 

Many of the Arizona and New Mexico men 
had taken part in warfare with the Apaches, 

24 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

those terrible Indians of the waterless Southwest- 
ern mountains — the most bloodthirsty and the 
wildest of all the red men of America, and the 
most formidable in their own dreadful style of 
warfare. Of course, a man who had kept his nerve 
and held his own, year after year, while living 
where each day and night contained the threat of 
hidden death from a foe whose goings and com- 
ings were unseen, was not apt to lose courage 
when confronted with any other enemy. An ex- 
perience in following in the trail of an enemy who 
might flee at one stretch through fifty miles of 
death-like desert was a good school out of which 
to come with profound indifference for the ordi- 
nary hardships of campaigning. 

As a rule, the men were more apt, however, to 
have had experience in warring against white 
desperadoes and law-breakers than against Indians. 
Some of our best recruits came from Colorado. 
One, a very large, hawk-eyed man, Benjamin 
Franklin Daniels, had been Marshal of Dodge City 
when that pleasing town was probably the toughest 
abode of civilized man to be found anywhere on 
the continent. In the course of the exercise of 
his rather lurid functions as peace-officer he had 
lost half of one ear — " bitten off," it was explained 
to me. Naturally, he viewed the dangers of bat- 
tle with philosophic calm. Such a man was, in 

25 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

reality, a veteran even in his first fight, and was a 
tower of strength to the recruits in his part of the 
line. With him there came into the regiment a 
deputy marshal from Cripple Creek named Sher- 
man Bell. Bell had a hernia, but he was so ex- 
cellent a man that we decided to take him. I 
do not think I ever saw greater resolution than 
Bell displayed throughout the campaign. In 
Cuba the great exertions which he was forced to 
make, again and again opened the hernia, and the 
surgeons insisted that he must return to the 
United States; but he simply would not go. 

Then there was little McGinty, the bronco-bus- 
ter from Oklahoma, who never had walked a 
hundred yards if by any possibility he could ride. 
When McGinty was reproved for his absolute in- 
ability to keep step on the drill-ground, he re- 
sponded that he was pretty sure he could keep 
step on horseback. McGinty's short legs caused 
him much trouble on the marches, but we had no 
braver or better man in the fights. 

One old friend of mine had come from far 
northern Idaho to join the regiment at San An- 
tonio. He was a hunter, named Fred Herrig, an 
Alsatian by birth. A dozen years before he and 
I had hunted mountain sheep and deer when lay- 
ing in the winter stock of meat for my ranch on 
the Little Missouri, sometimes in the bright fall 

26 




.^^J^g^gg, 



1 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

weather, sometimes in the Arctic bitterness of the 
early Northern winter. He was the most loyal 
and simple-hearted of men, and he had come to 
join his old " boss " and comrade in the bigger 
hunting which we were to carry on through the 
tropic mid-summer. 

The temptation is great to go on enumerating 
man after man who stood pre-eminent, whether 
as a killer of game, a tamer of horses, or a queller 
of disorder among his people, or who, mayhap, 
stood out with a more evil prominence as himself 
a dangerous man — one given to the taking of life 
on small provocation, or one who was ready to 
earn his living outside the law if the occasion de- 
manded it. There was tall Proffit, the sharp- 
shooter, from North Carolina — sinewy, saturnine, 
fearless; Smith, the bear-hunter from Wyoming, 
and McCann, the Arizona book-keeper, who had 
begun life as a buffalo-hunter. There was Croc- 
kett, the Georgian, who had been an Internal 
Revenue officer, and had waged perilous war on 
the rifle-bearing " moonshiners." There were 
Darnell and Wood of New Mexico, who could 
literally ride any horses alive. There were Good- 
win, and Buck Taylor, and Armstrong the ranger, 
crack shots with rifle or revolver. There was 
many a skilled packer who had led and guarded 
his trains of laden mules through the Indian- 

27 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

haunted country surrounding some out-post of 
civilization. There were men who had won fame 
as Rocky Mountain stage-drivers, or who had 
spent endless days in guiding the slow wagon- 
trains across the grassy plains. There were min- 
ers who knew every camp from the Yukon to 
Leadville, and cow-punchers in whose memories 
were stored the brands carried by the herds from 
Chihuahua to Assiniboia. There were men who 
had roped wild steers in the mesquite brush of the 
Nueces, and who, year in and year out, had driven 
the trail herds northward over desolate wastes and 
across the fords of shrunken rivers to the fatten- 
ing grounds of the Powder and the Yellowstone. 
They were hardened to the scorching heat and 
bitter cold of the dry plains and pine-clad moun- 
tains. They were accustomed to sleep in the 
open, while the picketed horses grazed beside 
them near some shallow, reedy pool. They had 
wandered hither and thither across the vast deso- 
lation of the wilderness, alone or with comrades. 
They had cowered in the shelter of cut banks 
from the icy blast of the norther, and far out on 
the midsummer prairies they had known the 
luxury of lying in the shade of the wagon during 
the noonday rest. They had lived in brush lean- 
tos for weeks at a time, or with only the wagon- 
sheet as an occasional house. They had fared 

28 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

hard when exploring the unknown; they had 
fared well on the round-up ; and they had known 
the plenty of the log ranch-houses, where the 
tables were spread with smoked venison and calf- 
ribs and milk and bread, and vegetables from the 
garden-patch. 

Such were the men we had as recruits : soldiers 
ready made, as far as concerned their capacity as 
individual fighters. What was necessary was to 
teach them to act together, and to obey orders. 
Our special task was to make them ready for 
action in the shortest possible time. We were 
bound to see fighting, and therefore to be with 
the first expedition that left the United States; 
for we could not tell how long the war would 
last. 

I had been quite prepared for trouble when it 
came to enforcing discipline, but I was agreeably 
disappointed. There were plenty of hard charac- 
ters who might by themselves have given trouble, 
and with one or two of whom we did have to 
take rough measures ; but the bulk of the men 
thoroughly understood that without discipline 
they would be merely a valueless mob, and they 
set themselves hard at work to learn the new 
duties. Of course, such a regiment, in spite of, 
or indeed I might almost say because of, the 
characteristics which made the individual men so 

29 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

exceptionally formidable as soldiers, could very 
readily have been spoiled. Any weakness in the 
commander would have ruined it. On the other 
hand, to treat it from the stand-point of the marti- 
net and military pedant would have been almost 
equally fatal. From the beginning we started 
out to secure the essentials of discipline, while 
laying just as little stress as possible on the non- 
essentials. The men were singularly quick to re- 
spond to any appeal to their intelligence and patri- 
otism. The faults they committed were those of 
ignorance merely. When Holderman, in an- 
nouncing dinner to the Colonel and the three 
Majors, genially remarked, " If you fellars don't 
come soon, everything '11 get cold," he had no 
thought of other than a kindly and respectful re- 
gard for their welfare, and was glad to modify his 
form of address on being told that it was not what 
could be described as conventionally military. 
When one of our sentinels, who had with much 
labor learned the manual of arms, saluted with 
great pride as I passed, and added, with a friendly 
nod, " Good-evening, Colonel," this variation in 
the accepted formula on such occasions was meant, 
and was accepted, as mere friendly interest. In 
both cases the needed instruction was given and 
received in the same kindly spirit. 

One of the new Indian Territory recruits, after 
30 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

twenty-four hours' stay in camp, during which he 
had held himself distinctly aloof from the general 
interests, called on the Colonel in his tent, and re- 
marked, " Well, Colonel, I want to shake hands 
and say we're with you. We didn't know how 
we would like you fellars at first ; but you're all 
right, and you know your business, and you mean 
business, and you can count on us every time ! " 

That same night, which was hot, mosquitoes 
were very annoying; and shortly after midnight 
both the Colonel and I came to the doors of our 
respective tents, which adjoined one another. 
The sentinel in front was also fighting mosqui- 
toes. As we came out we saw him pitch his gun 
about ten feet off, and sit down to attack some of 
the pests that had swarmed up his trousers' legs. 
Happening to glance in our direction, he nodded 
pleasantly and, with unabashed and friendly feel- 
ing, remarked, " Ain't they bad ? " 

It was astonishing how soon the men got over 
these little peculiarities. They speedily grew to 
recognize the fact that the observance of certain 
forms was essential to the maintenance of proper 
discipline. They became scrupulously careful in 
touching their hats, and always came to attention 
when spoken to. They saw that we did not in- 
sist upon the observance of these forms to humili- 
ate them; that we were as anxious to learn 

31 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

our own duties as we were to have them learn 
theirs, and as scrupulous in paying respect to our 
superiors as we were in exacting the acknowl- 
edgment due our rank from those below us; 
moreover, what was very important, they saw that 
we were careful to look after their interests in 
every way, and were doing all that was possible 
to hurry up the equipment and drill of the regi- 
ment, so as to get into the war. 

Rigid guard duty was established at once, and 
everyone was impressed with the necessity for 
vigilance and watchfulness. The policing of the 
camp was likewise attended to with the utmost 
rigor. As always with new troops, they were at 
first indifferent to the necessity for cleanliness 
in camp arrangements ; but on this point Colonel 
Wood brooked no laxity, and in a very little 
while the hygienic conditions of the camp were 
as good as those of any regular regiment. Mean- 
while the men were being drilled, on foot at first, 
with the utmost assiduity. Every night we had 
officers' school, the non-commissioned officers of 
each troop being given similar schooling by the 
Captain or one of the Lieutenants of the troop ; 
and every day we practised hard, by squad, by 
troop, by squadron and battalion. The earnest- 
ness and intelligence with which the men went to 
work rendered the task of instruction much less 

3a 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

difficult than would be supposed. It soon grew 
easy to handle the regiment in all the simpler 
forms of close and open order. When they had 
grown so that they could be handled with ease in 
marching, and in the ordinary manoeuvres of the 
drill-ground, we began to train them in open-order 
work, skirmishing and firing. Here their wood- 
craft and plainscraft, their knowledge of the rifle, 
helped us very much. Skirmishing they took to 
naturally, which was fortunate, as practically all 
our fighting was done in open order. 

Meanwhile we were purchasing horses. Judg- 
ing from what I saw I do not think that we got 
heavy enough animals, and of those purchased 
certainly a half were nearly unbroken. It was no 
easy matter to handle them on the picket-lines, 
and to provide for feeding and watering; and the 
efforts to shoe and ride them were at first produc- 
tive of much vigorous excitement. Of course, 
those that were wild from the range had to be 
thrown and tied down before they could be shod. 
Half the horses of the regiment bucked, or pos- 
sessed some other of the amiable weaknesses inci- 
dent to horse life on the great ranches; but we 
had abundance of men who were utterly unmoved 
by any antic a horse might commit. Every ani- 
mal was speedily mastered, though a large num- 
ber remained to the end mounts upon which an 

33 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ordinary rider would have felt very uncomforta- 
ble. 

My own horses were purchased for me by a 
Texas friend, John Moore, with whom I had 
once hunted peccaries on the Nueces. I only 
paid fifty dollars apiece, and the animals were not 
showy ; but they were tough and hardy, and an- 
swered my purpose well. 

Mounted drill with such horses and men bade 
fair to offer opportunities for excitement; yet it 
usually went off smoothly enough. Before drill- 
ing the men on horseback they had all been 
drilled on foot, and having gone at their work 
with hearty zest, they knew well the simple move- 
ments to form any kind of line or column. 
Wood was busy from morning till night in hurry- 
ing the final details of the equipment, and he 
turned the drill of the men over to me. To drill 
perfectly needs long practice, but to drill roughly 
is a thing very easy to learn indeed. We were 
not always right about our intervals, our lines 
were somewhat irregular, and our more difficult 
movements were executed at times in rather a 
haphazard way ; but the essential commands and 
the essential movements we learned without any 
difficulty, and the men peformed them with great 
dash. When we put them on horseback, there 
was, of course, trouble with the horses ; but the 

34 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

horsemanship of the riders was consummate. In 
fact, the men were immensely interested in mak- 
ing their horses perform each evolution with the 
utmost speed and accuracy, and in forcing each 
unquiet, vicious brute to get into line and stay in 
line, whether he would or not. The guidon- 
bearers held their plunging steeds true to the line, 
no matter what they tried to do ; and each wild 
rider brought his wild horse into his proper place 
with a dash and ease which showed the natural 
cavalryman. 

In short, from the very beginning the horseback 
drills were good fun, and everyone enjoyed them. 
We marched out through the adjoining country 
to drill wherever we found open ground, practis- 
ing all the dilEFerent column formations as we 
went. On the open ground we threw out the 
line to one side or the other, and in one position 
and the other, sometimes at the trot, sometimes at 
the gallop. As the men grew accustomed to the 
simple evolutions, we tried them more and more 
in skirmish drills, practising them so that they 
might get accustomed to advance in open order 
and to skirmish in any country, while the horses 
were held in the rear. 

Our arms were the regular cavalry carbine, the 
" Krag," a splendid weapon, and the revolver. 
A few carried their favorite Winchesters, using, 

35 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

of course, the new model, which took the Govern- 
ment cartridge. We feh very strongly that it 
would be worse than a waste of time to try to 
train our men to use the sabre — a weapon utterly 
alien to them; but with the rifle and revolver 
they were already thoroughly familiar. Many of 
my cavalry friends in the past had insisted to me 
that the revolver was a better weapon than the 
sword — among them Basil Duke, the noted Con- 
federate cavalry leader, and Captain Frank Ed- 
wards, whom I had met when elk-hunting on the 
head-waters of the Yellowstone and the Snake. 
Personally, I knew too little to decide as to the 
comparative merits of the two arms ; but I did 
know that it was a great deal better to use the 
arm with which our men were already pro- 
ficient. They were therefore armed with what 
might be called their natural weapon, the re- 
volver. 

As it turned out, we were not used mounted at 
all, so that our preparations on this point came to 
nothing. In a way, I have always regretted this. 
We thought we should at least be employed as 
cavalry in the great campaign against Havana in 
the fall ; and from the beginning I began to train 
my men in shock tactics for use against hostile 
cavalry. My belief was that the horse was really 
the weapon with which to strike the first blow. 

36 



RAISING THE REGIMENT 

I felt that if my men could be trained to hit their 
adversaries with their horses, it was a matter of 
small amount whether, at the moment when the 
onset occurred, sabres, lances, or revolvers were 
used; while in the subsequent mclce I believed 
the revolver would outclass cold steel as a weapon. 
But this is all guesswork, for we never had occa- 
sion to try the experiment. 

It was astonishing what a difference was made 
by two or three weeks' training. The mere 
thorough performance of guard and police duties 
helped the men very rapidly to become soldiers. 
The officers studied hard, and both officers and 
men worked hard in the drill-field. It was, of 
course, rough and ready drill ; but it was very 
efficient, and it was suited to the men who made 
up the regiment. Their uniform also suited them. 
In their slouch hats, blue flannel shirts, brown 
trousers, leggings and boots, with handkerchiefs 
knotted loosely around their necks, they looked 
exactly as a body of cow-boy cavalry should look. 
The officers speedily grew to realize that they 
must not be over-familiar with their men, and 
yet that they must care for them in every way. 
The men, in return, began to acquire those habits 
of attention to soldierly detail which mean so 
much in making a regiment. Above all, every 
man felt, and had constantly instilled into him, a 

37 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

keen pride of the regiment, and a resolute pur- 
pose to do his whole duty uncomplainingly, and, 
above all, to win glory by the way he handled 
himself in battle. 



38 




^. 



•^^^ 



C" 



Dra'i-vn by Charles Dana Gibson. 

COLONEL THEODORE ROOSEVELT. 



II 

TO CUBA 

UP to the last moment we were spending 
every ounce of energy we had in getting 
the regiment into shape. Fortunately, 
there were a good many vacancies among the 
officers, as the original number of 780 men was 
increased to 1,000; so that two companies were 
organized entirely anew. This gave the chance 
to promote some first-rate men. 

One of the most useful members of the regi- 
ment was Dr. Robb Church, formerly a Princeton 
foot-ball player. He was appointed as Assistant 
Surgeon, but acted throughout almost all the Cu- 
ban campaign as the Regimental Surgeon. It 
was Dr. Church who first gave me an idea of 
Bucky O'NeiU's versatility, for I happened to 
overhear them discussing Aryan word-roots to- 
gether, and then sliding off into a review of the 
novels of Balzac, and a discussion as to how far 
Balzac could be said to be the founder of the 
modern realistic school of fiction. Church had 
led almost as varied a life as Bucky himself, his 

39 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

career including incidents as far apart as explor- 
ing and elk-hunting in the Olympic Mountains, 
cooking in a lumber-camp, and serving as doctor 
on an emigrant ship. 

Woodbury Kane was given a commission, and 
also Horace Devereux, of Princeton. Kane was 
older than the other college men who entered in 
the ranks ; and as he had the same good qualities 
to start with, this resulted in his ultimately be- 
coming perhaps the most useful soldier in the reg- 
iment. He escaped wounds and serious sickness, 
and was able to serve through every day of the 
regiment's existence. 

Two of the men made Second Lieutenants by 
promotion from the ranks while in San Antonio 
were John Greenway, a noted Yale foot-ball 
player and catcher on her base-ball nine, and 
David Goodrich, for two years captain of the 
Harvard crew. They were young men, Good- 
rich having only just graduated; while Green- 
way, whose father had served with honor in the 
Confederate Army, had been out of Yale three 
or four years. They were natural soldiers, and it 
would be well-nigh impossible to overestimate 
the amount of good they did the regiment. They 
were strapping fellows, entirely fearless, modest, 
and quiet. Their only thought was how to per- 
fect themselves in their own duties, and how to 

40 



TO CUBA 

take care of .the men under them, so as to bring 
them to the highest point of soldierly perfection. 
I grew steadily to rely upon them, as men who 
could be counted upon with absolute certainty, 
not only in every emergency, but in all routine 
work. They were never so tired as not to re- 
spond with eagerness to the slightest suggestion 
of doing something new, whether it was danger- 
ous or merely difficult and laborious. They not 
merely did their duty, but were always on the 
watch to find out some new duty which they 
could construe to be theirs. Whether it was po- 
licing camp, or keeping guard, or preventing 
straggling on the march, or procuring food for the 
men, or seeing that they took care of themselves 
in camp, or performing some feat of unusual 
hazard in the fight — no call was ever made upon 
them to which they did not respond with eager 
thankfulness for being given the chance to an- 
swer it. Later on I worked them as hard as I 
knew how, and the regiment will always be their 
debtor. 

Greenway was from Arkansas. We could have 
filled up the whole regiment many times over 
from the South Atlantic and Gulf States alone, 
but were only able to accept a very few appli- 
cants. One of them was John Mcllhenny, of 
Louisiana; a planter and manufacturer, a big- 

41 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

game hunter and book-lover, who could have had 
a commission in the Louisiana troops, but who 
preferred to go as a trooper in the Rough Riders 
because he beheved we would surely see fighting. 
He could have commanded any influence, social 
or political, he wished ; but he never asked a 
favor of any kind. He went into one of the 
New Mexican troops, and by his high qualities 
and zealous attention to duty speedily rose to a 
sergeantcy, and finally won his lieutenancy for 
gallantry in action. 

The tone of the officers' mess was very high. 
Everyone seemed to realize that he had under- 
taken most serious work. They all earnestly 
wished for a chance to distinguish themselves, and 
fully appreciated that they ran the risk not merely 
of death, but of what was infinitely worse — 
namely, failure at the crisis to perform duty well ; 
and they strove earnestly so to train themselves, 
and the men under them, as to minimize the pos- 
sibility of such disgrace. Every officer and every 
man was taught continually to look forward to 
the day of battle eagerly, but with an entire sense 
of the drain that would then be made upon his 
endurance and resolution. They were also taught 
that, before the battle came, the rigorous perform- 
ance of the countless irksome duties of the camp 
and the march was demanded from all alike, and 

42 



TO CUBA 

that no excuse would be tolerated for failure to 
perform duty. Very few of the men had gone 
into the regiment lightly, and the fact that they 
did their duty so well may be largely attributed 
to the seriousness with which these eager, adven- 
turous young fellows approached their work. This 
seriousness, and a certain simple manliness which 
accompanied it, had one very pleasant side. Dur- 
ing our entire time of service, I never heard in 
the officers' mess a foul story or a foul word ; and 
though there was occasional hard swearing in 
moments of emergency, yet even this was the 
exception. 

The regiment attracted adventurous spirits from 
everywhere. Our chief trumpeter was a native 
American, our second trumpeter was from the 
Mediterranean — I think an Italian — who had 
been a soldier of fortune not only in Egypt, but 
in the French Army in Southern China. Two 
excellent men were Osborne, a tall Australian, 
who had been an officer in the New South Wales 
Mounted Rifles ; and Cook, an Englishman, who 
had served in South Africa. Both, when the reg- 
iment disbanded, were plaintive in expressing 
their fond regret that it could not be used against 
the Transvaal Boers I 

One of our best soldiers was a man whose real 
and assumed names I, for obvious reasons con- 

43 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ceal. He usually went by a nickname which I 
will call Tennessee. He was a tall, gaunt fellow, 
with a quiet and distinctly sinister eye, who did 
his duty excellently, especially when a fight was 
on, and who, being an expert gambler, always 
contrived to reap a rich harvest after pay-day. 
When the regiment was mustered out, he asked 
me to put a brief memorandum of his services 
on his discharge certificate, which I gladly did. 
He much appreciated this, and added, in expla- 
nation, " You see. Colonel, my real name isn't 
Smith, its Yancy. I had to change it, because 
three or four years ago I had a little trouble with 
a gentleman, and — er — well, in fact, I had to kill 
him ; and the District Attorney, he had it in for 
me, and so I just skipped the country ; and now, 
if it ever should be brought up against me, I 
should like to show your certificate as to my char- 
acter I " The course of frontier justice sometimes 
moves in unexpected zigzags ; so I did not ex- 
press the doubt I felt as to whether my certificate 
that he had been a good soldier would help him 
much if he was tried for a murder committed 
three or four years previously. 

The men worked hard and faithfully. As a 
rule, in spite of the number of rough characters 
among them, they behaved very well. One night 
a few of them went on a spree, and proceeded 

44 



TO CUBA 

" to paint San Antonia red." One was captured 
by the city authorities, and we had to leave him 
behind us in jail. The others we dealt with our- 
selves, in a way that prevented a repetition of the 
occurrence. 

The men speedily gave one another nicknames, 
largely conferred in a spirit of derision, their 
basis lying in contrast. A brave but fastidious 
member of a well-known Eastern club, who was 
serving in the ranks, was christened "Tough 
Ike " ; and his bunkie, the man who shared his 
shelter-tent, who was a decidedly rough cow- 
puncher, gradually acquired the name of " The 
Dude." One unlucky and simple-minded cow- 
puncher, who had never been east of the great 
plains in his life, unwarily boasted that he had an 
aunt in New York, and ever afterward went by 
the name of " Metropolitan Bill." A huge red- 
headed Irishman was named " Sheeny Solomon." 
A young Jew who developed into one of the best 
fighters in the regiment accepted, with entire 
equanimity, the name of " Pork-chop." We had 
quite a number of professional gamblers, who, I 
am bound to say, usually made good soldiers. 
One, who was almost abnormally quiet and gentle, 
was called " Hell Roarer " ; while another, who in 
point of language and deportment was his exact 
antithesis, was christened " Prayerful James." 

45 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

While the officers and men were learning their 
duties, and learning to know one another, Colonel 
Wood was straining every nerve to get our equip- 
ments — an effort which was complicated by the 
tendency of the Ordnance Bureau to send what- 
ever we really needed by freight instead of ex- 
press. Finally, just as the last rifles, revolvers, 
and saddles came, we were ordered by wire at 
once to proceed by train to Tampa. 

Instantly, all was joyful excitement. We had 
enjoyed San Antonio, and were glad that our reg- 
iment had been organized in the city where the 
Alamo commemorates the death fight of Crock- 
ett, Bowie, and their famous band of frontier 
heroes. All of us had worked hard, so that we 
had had no time to be homesick or downcast ; but 
we were glad to leave the hot camp, where every 
day the strong wind sifted the dust through every- 
thing, and to start for the gathering-place of the 
army which was to invade Cuba. Our horses and 
men were getting into good shape. We were 
well enough equipped to warrant our starting on 
the campaign, and every man was filled with 
dread of being out of the fighting. We had a 
pack-train of 150 mules, so we had close on to 
1,200 animals to carry. 

Of course, our train was split up into sections, 
seven, all told ; Colonel Wood commanding the 

46 



TO CUBA 

first three, and I the last four. The journey by 
rail from San Antonio to Tampa took just four 
days, and I doubt if anybody who was on the 
trip will soon forget it. To occupy my few spare 
moments, I was reading M. Demolins's " Supe- 
riorite des Anglo-Saxons." M. Demolins, in 
giving the reasons why the English-speaking peo- 
ples are superior to those of Continental Europe, 
lays much stress upon the way in which " militar- 
ism " deadens the power of individual initiative, 
the soldier being trained to complete suppression 
of individual will, while his faculties become 
atrophied in consequence of his being merely a cog 
in a vast and perfectly ordered machine. I can 
assure tl\e excellent French publicist that Amer- 
ican " militarism," at least of the volunteer sort, 
has points of difference from the militarism of 
Continental Europe. The battalion chief of a 
newly raised American regiment, when striving to 
get into a war which the American people have 
undertaken with buoyant and light-hearted indif- 
ference to detail, has positively unlimited oppor- 
tunity for the display of " individual initiative," 
and is in no danger whatever either of suffering 
from unhealthy suppression of personal will, or 
of finding his faculties of self-help numbed by 
becoming a cog in a gigantic and smooth-running 
machine. If such a battalion chief wants to get 

47 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

anything or go anywhere he must do it by exer- 
cising every pound of resource, inventiveness, 
and audacity he possesses. The help, advice, 
and superintendence he gets from outside will be 
of the most general, not to say superficial, char- 
acter. If he is a cavalry officer, he has got to 
hurry and push the purchase of his horses, plung- 
ing into and out of the meshes of red-tape as 
best he can. He will have to fight for his rifles 
and his tents and his clothes. He will have to 
keep his men healthy largely by the light that 
nature has given him. When he wishes to em- 
bark his regiment, he will have to fight for his 
railway-cars exactly as he fights for his transport 
when it comes to going across the sea; and on 
his journey his men will or will not have food, 
and his horses will or will not have water and 
hay, and the trains will or will not make connec- 
tions, in exact correspondence to the energy and 
success of his own efforts to keep things moving 
straight. 

It was on Sunday, May 29th, that we marched 
out of our hot, windy, dusty camp to take the 
cars for Tampa. Colonel Wood went first, with 
the three sections under his special care. I fol- 
lowed with the other four. The railway had 
promised us a forty-eight hours' trip, but our ex- 
perience in loading was enough to show that the 

48 



TO CUBA 

promise would not be made good. There were 
no proper facilities for getting the horses on or 
off the cars, or for feeding or watering them; and 
there was endless confusion and delay among the 
railway officials. I marched my four sections over 
in the afternoon, the first three having taken the 
entire day to get off. We occupied the night. 
As far as the regiment itself was concerned, we 
worked an excellent system, Wood instructing 
me exactly how to proceed so as to avoid confu- 
sion. Being a veteran campaigner, he had all 
along insisted that for such work as we had before 
us we must travel with the minimum possible 
luggage. The men had merely what they could 
carry on their own backs, and the officers very 
little more. My own roll of clothes and bedding 
could be put on my spare horse. The mule-train 
was to be used simply for food, forage, and spare 
ammunition. As it turned out, we were not al- 
lowed to take either it or the horses. 

It was dusk when I marched my long files of 
dusty troopers into the station-yard. I then made 
all dismount, excepting the troop which I first in- 
tended to load. This was brought up to the first 
freight-car. Here every man unsaddled, and left 
his saddle, bridle, and all that he did not himself 
need in the car, each individual's property being 
corded together. A guard was left in the car, and 

49 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the rest of the men took the naked horses into the 
pens to be fed and watered. The other troops 
were loaded in the same way in succession. With 
each section there were thus a couple of baggage- 
cars in which the horse-gear, the superfluous bag- 
gage, and the travel rations were carried; and I 
also put aboard, not only at starting, but at every 
other opportunity, what oats and hay I could get, 
so as to provide against accidents for the horses. 
By the time the baggage-cars were loaded the horses 
of the first section had eaten and drunk their fill, 
and we loaded them on cattle-cars. The officers 
of each troop saw to the loading, taking a dozen 
picked men to help them; for some of the wild 
creatures, half broken and fresh from the ranges, 
were with difficulty driven up the chutes. Mean- 
while I superintended not merely my own men, 
but the railroad men ; and when the delays of the 
latter, and their inability to understand what was 
necessary, grew past bearing, I took charge of the 
trains myself, so as to insure the horse-cars of each 
section being coupled with the baggage-cars of 
that section. 

We worked until long past midnight before 
we got the horses and baggage aboard, and then 
found that for some reason the passenger-cars were 
delayed and would not be out for some hours. In 
the confusion and darkness men of the different 

50 



TO CUBA 

troops had become scattered, and some had drifted 
off to the vile drinking-booths around the stock- 
yards ; so I sent details to search the latter, while 
the trumpeters blew the assembly until the First 
Sergeants could account for all the men. Then 
the troops were arranged in order, and the men 
of each lay down where they were, by the tracks 
and in the brush, to sleep until morning. 

At dawn the passenger-trains arrived. The sen- 
ior Captain of each section saw to it that his own 
horses, troopers, and baggage were together; and 
one by one they started off, I taking the last in 
person. Captain Capron had at the very begin- 
ning shown himself to be simply invaluable, from 
his extraordinary energy, executive capacity, and 
mastery over men ; and I kept his section next 
mine, so that we generally came together at the 
different yards. 

The next four days were very hot and very 
dusty. I tried to arrange so the sections would 
be far enough apart to allow each ample time to 
unload, feed, water, and load the horses at any 
stopping-place before the next section could ar- 
rive. There was enough delay and failure to make 
connections on the part of the railroad people to 
keep me entirely busy, not to speak of seeing at 
the stopping-places that the inexperienced officers 
got enough hay for their horses, and that the water 

51 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

given to them was both ample in quantity and 
drinkable. It happened that we usually made our 
longest stops at night, and this meant that we were 
up all night long. 

Two or three times a day I got the men buck- 
ets of hot coffee, and when we made a long enough 
stop they were allowed liberty under the supervi- 
sion of the non-commissioned officers. Some of 
them abused the privilege, and started to get 
drunk. These were promptly handled with the 
necessary severity, in the interest of the others; 
for it was only by putting an immediate check to 
every form of lawlessness or disobedience among 
the few men who were inclined to be bad that 
we were enabled to give full liberty to those who 
would not abuse it. 

Everywhere the people came out to greet us 
and cheer us. They brought us flowers; they 
brought us watermelons and other fruits, and 
sometimes jugs and pails of milk — all of which 
we greatly appreciated. We were travelling 
through a region where practically all the older 
men had served in the Confederate Army, and 
where the younger men had all their lives long 
drunk in the endless tales told by their elders, at 
home, and at the cross-roads taverns, and in the 
court-house squares, about the cavalry of Forrest 
and Morgan and the infantry of Jackson and 

52 



TO CUBA 

Hood. The blood of the old men stirred to the 
distant breath of battle ; the blood of the young 
men leaped hot with eager desire to accompany 
us. The older women, who remembered the 
dreadful misery of war — the misery that presses 
its iron weight most heavily on the wives and the 
little ones — looked sadly at us; but the young 
girls drove down in bevies, arrayed in their finery, 
to wave flags in farewell to the troopers and to 
beg cartridges and buttons as mementos. Every- 
where we saw the Stars and Stripes, and every- 
where we were told, half-laughing, by grizzled ex- 
Confederates that they had never dreamed in the by- 
gone days of bitterness to greet the old flag as they 
now were greeting it, and to send their sons, as now 
they were sending them, to fight and die under it. 
It was four days later that we disembarked, in 
a perfect welter of confusion. Tampa lay in the 
pine-covered sand-flats at the end of a one-track 
railroad, and everything connected with both mili- 
tary and railroad matters was in an almost inex- 
tricable tangle. There was no one to meet us 
or to tell us where we were to camp, and no one 
to issue us food for the first twenty-four hours; 
while the railroad people unloaded us wherever 
they pleased, or rather wherever the jam of all 
kinds of trains rendered it possible. We had to 
buy the men food out of our own pockets, and 

53 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

to seize wagons in order to get our spare bag- 
gage taken to the camping ground which we at 
last found had been allotted to us. 

Once on the ground, we speedily got order out 
of confusion. Under Wood's eye the tents were 
put up in long streets, the picket-line of each 
troop stretching down its side of each street. The 
officers' quarters were at the upper ends of the 
streets, the company kitchens and sinks at the 
opposite ends. The camp was strictly policed, 
and drill promptly begun. For thirty-six hours 
we let the horses rest, drilling on foot, and then 
began the mounted drill again. The regiments 
with which we were afterward to serve were 
camped near us, and the sandy streets of the little 
town were thronged with soldiers, almost all of 
them regulars ; for there were but one or two vol- 
unteer organizations besides ourselves. The reg- 
ulars wore the canonical dark blue of Uncle Sam. 
Our own men were clad in dusty brown blouses, 
trousers and leggings being of the same hue, 
while the broad-brimmed soft hat was of dark 
gray; and very workmanlike they looked as, in 
column of fours, each troop trotted down its com- 
pany street to form by squadron or battalion, the 
troopers sitting steadily in the saddles as they 
made their half-trained horses conform to the 
movement of the guidons. 

54 




Chaplain Brown Preaching to the Regunent. 



TO CUBA 

Over in Tampa town the huge winter hotel 
was gay with general-officers and their staffs, with 
women in pretty dresses, with newspaper corre- 
spondents by the score, with miHtary attaches of 
foreign powers, and with onlookers of all sorts; 
but we spent very little time there. 

We worked with the utmost industry, special 
attention being given by each troop-commander 
to skirmish-drill in the woods. Once or twice we 
had mounted drill of the regiment as a whole. 
The military attaches came out to look on — Eng- 
lish, German, Russian, French, and Japanese. 
With the Englishman, Captain Arthur Lee, a cap- 
ital fellow, we soon struck up an especially close 
friendship; and we saw much of him through- 
out the campaign. So we did of several of the 
newspaper correspondents — Richard Harding 
Davis, John Fox, Jr., Caspar Whitney, and Fred- 
eric Remington. On Sunday Chaplain Brown, 
of Arizona, held service, as he did almost every 
Sunday during the campaign. 

There were but four or five days at Tampa, 
however. We were notified that the expedition 
would start for destination unknown at once, and 
that we were to go with it ; but that our horses 
were to be left behind, and only eight troops of 
seventy men each taken. Our sorrow at leaving 
the horses was entirely outweighed by our joy at 

55 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

going ; but it was very hard indeed to select the 
four troops that were to stay, and the men who 
had to be left behind from each of the troops that 
went. Colonel Wood took Major Brodie and 
myself to command the two squadrons, being al- 
lowed only two squadron commanders. The men 
who were left behind felt the most bitter heart- 
burn. To the great bulk of them I think it will 
be a life-long sorrow. I saw more than one, both 
among the officers and privates, burst into tears 
when he found he could not go. No outsider 
can appreciate the bitterness of the disappoint- 
ment. Of course, really, those that stayed were 
entitled to precisely as much honor as those that 
went. Each man was doing his duty, and much 
the hardest and most disagreeable duty was to 
stay. Credit should go with the performance of 
duty, and not with what is very often the acci- 
dent of glory. All this and much more we ex- 
plained, but our explanations could not alter the 
fact that some had to be chosen and some had to 
be left. One of the Captains chosen was Captain 
Maximilian Luna, who commanded Troop F, 
from New Mexico. The Captain's people had 
been on the banks of the Rio Grande before my 
forefathers came to the mouth of the Hudson or 
Wood's landed at Plymouth ; and he made the 
plea that it was his right to go as a representative 

56 







Troop H, shortly after Arrival at Tampa. 



TO CUBA 

of his race, for he was the only man of pure 
Spanish blood who bore a commission in the 
army, and he demanded the privilege of proving 
that his people were precisely as loyal Americans 
as any others. I was glad when it was decided to 
take him. 

It was the evening of June 7th when we sud- 
denly received orders that the expedition was to 
start from Port Tampa, nine miles distant by rail, 
at daybreak the following morning ; and that if 
we were not aboard our transport by that time we 
could not go. We had no intention of getting 
left, and prepared at once for the scramble which 
was evidently about to take place. As the num- 
ber and capacity of the transports were known, or 
ought to have been known, and as the number 
and size of the regiments to go were also known, 
the task of allotting each regiment or fraction of 
a regiment to its proper transport, and arranging 
that the regiments and the transports should meet 
in due order on the dock, ought not to have been 
difficult. However, no arrangements were made 
in advance ; and we were allowed to shove and 
hustle for ourselves as best we could, on much the 
same principles that had governed our prepara- 
tions hitherto. 

We were ordered to be at a certain track with 
all our baggage at midnight, there to take a train 

57 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

for Port Tampa. At the appointed time we turned 
up, but the train did not. The men slept heavily, 
while Wood and I and various other officers wan- 
dered about in search of information which no one 
could give. We now and then came across a 
Brigadier-General, or even a Major-General ; but 
nobody knew anything. Some regiments got 
aboard the trains and some did not, but as none 
of the trains started this made little difference. At 
three o'clock we received orders to march over 
to an entirely different track, and away we went. 
No train appeared on this track either ; but at six 
o'clock some coal-cars came by, and these we 
seized. By various arguments we persuaded the 
engineer in charge of the train to back us down 
the nine miles to Port Tampa, where we arrived 
covered with coal-dust, but with all our belong- 
ings. 

The railway tracks ran out on the quay, and 
the transports, which had been anchored in mid- 
stream, were gradually being brought up along- 
side the quay and loaded. The trains were 
unloading wherever they happened to be, no atten- 
tion whatever being paid to the possible position 
of the transport on which the soldiers were to go. 
Colonel Wood and I jumped off and started on a 
hunt, which soon convinced us that we had our 
work cut out if we were to get a transport at all. 

58 



TO CUBA 

From the highest General down, nobody could 
tell us where to go to find out what transport we 
were to have. At last we were informed that we 
were to hunt up the depot quartermaster, Colonel 
Humphrey. We found his office, where his as- 
sistant informed us that he didn't know where the 
Colonel was, but believed him to be asleep upon 
one of the transports. This seemed odd at such 
a time ; but so many of the methods in vogue 
were odd, that we were quite prepared to accept 
it as a fact. However, it proved not to be such ; 
but for an hour Colonel Humphrey might just as 
well have been asleep, as nobody knew where he 
was and nobody could find him, and the quay 
was crammed with some ten thousand men, most 
of whom were working at cross purposes. 

At last, however, after over an hour's industri- 
ous and rapid search through this swarming ant- 
heap of humanity. Wood and I, who had sepa- 
rated, found Colonel Humphrey at nearly the 
same time and were alloted a transport — the Yu- 
catan. She was out in midstream, so Wood 
seized a stray launch and boarded her. At the 
same time I happened to find out that she had 
previously been allotted to two other regiments — 
the Second Regular Infantry and the Seventy- 
first New York Volunteers, which latter regiment 
alone contained more men than could be put 

59 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

aboard her. Accordingly, I ran at full speed to 
our train ; and leaving a strong guard with the 
baggage, I double-quicked the rest of the regi- 
ment up to the boat, just in time to board her as 
she came into the quay, and then to hold her 
against the Second Regulars and the Seventy-first, 
who had arrived a little too late, being a shade 
less ready than we were in the matter of individual 
initiative. There was a good deal of expostula- 
tion, but we had possession ; and as the ship could 
not contain half of the men who had been told to 
go aboard her, the Seventy-first went away, as did 
all but four companies of the Second. These lat- 
ter we took aboard. Meanwhile a General had 
caused our train to be unloaded at the end of the 
quay farthest from where the ship was ; and the 
hungry, tired men spent most of the day in the 
labor of bringing down their baggage and the 
food and ammunition. 

The officers' horses were on another boat, my 
own being accompanied by my colored body- 
servant, Marshall, the most faithful and loyal of 
men, himself an old soldier of the Ninth Cavalry. 
Marshall had been in Indian campaigns, and he 
christened my larger horse " Rain-in-the-Face," 
while the other, a pony, went by the name of 
" Texas." 

By the time that night fell, and our transport 
60 




Scene on the Duck at Purt Tampa on the Day of Saihng of the Transports. 



TO CUBA 

pulled off and anchored in midstream, we felt we 
had spent thirty-six tolerably active hours. The 
transport was overloaded, the men being packed 
like sardines, not only below but upon the decks ; so 
that at night it was only possible to walk about by 
continually stepping over the bodies of the sleep- 
ers. The travel rations which had been issued to 
the men for the voyage were not sufficient, be- 
cause the meat was very bad indeed ; and when a 
ration consists of only four or five items, which 
taken together just meet the requirements of a 
strong and healthy man, the loss of one item is a 
serious thing. If we had been given canned corn- 
beef we would have been all right, but instead of 
this the soldiers were issued horrible stuff called 
" canned fresh beef" There was no salt in it. At 
the best it was stringy and tasteless ; at the worst 
it was nauseating. Not one-fourth of it was ever 
eaten at all, even when the men became very 
hungry. There were no facilities for the men to 
cook anything. There was no ice for them ; the 
water was not good ; and they had no fresh meat 
or fresh vegetables. 

However, all these things seemed of small im. 
portance compared with the fact that we were 
really embarked, and were with the first expedi- 
tion to leave our shores. But by next morning 
came the news that the order to sail had been 

6i 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

countermanded, and tliat we were to stay where 
we were for the time being. What this meant 
none of us could understand. It turned out later 
to be due to the blunder of a naval officer who 
mistook some of our vessels for Spaniards, and by 
his report caused consternation in Washington, 
until by vigorous scouting on the part of our 
other ships the illusion was dispelled. 

Meanwhile the troop-ships, packed tight with 
their living freight, sweltered in the burning heat 
of Tampa Harbor. There was nothing whatever 
for the men to do, space being too cramped for 
amusement or for more drill than was implied in 
the manual of arms. In this we drilled them as- 
siduously, and we also continued to hold school 
for both the officers and the non-commissioned 
officers. Each troop commander was regarded as 
responsible for his own non-commissioned officers, 
and Wood or myself simply dropped in to super- 
intend, just as we did with the manual at arms. 
In the officers' school Captain Capron was the 
special instructor, and a most admirable one he 
was. 

The heat, the steaming discomfort, and the 
confinement, together with the forced inaction, 
were very irksome ; but everyone made the best 
of it, and there was little or no grumbling even 
among the men. All, from the highest to the low- 

62 



TO CUBA 

est, were bent upon perfecting themselves accord- 
ing to their slender opportunities. Every book of 
tactics in the regiment was in use from morning 
until night, and the officers and non-commissioned 
officers were always studying the problems pre- 
sented at the schools. About the only amusement 
was bathing over the side, in which we indulged 
both in the morning and evening. Many ot tlie 
men from the Far West had never seen the ocean. 
One of them who knew how to swim was much 
interested in finding that the ocean water was not 
drinkable. Another, who had never in his life be- 
fore seen any water more extensive that the head- 
stream of the Rio Grande, met with an accident 
later in the voyage; that is, his hat blew away 
while we were in mid-ocean, and I heard him ex- 
plaining the accident to a friend in the following 
words: " Oh-o-h, Jim! Ma hat blew into the 
creek I " So we lay for nearly a week, the vessels 
swinging around on their anchor chains, while the 
hot water of the bay flowed to and fro around 
them and the sun burned overhead. 

At last, on the evening of June 13th, we re- 
ceived the welcome order to start. Ship after 
ship weighed anchor and went slowly ahead under 
half-steam for the distant mouth of the harbor, the 
bands playing, the flags flying, the rigging black 
with the clustered soldiers, cheering and shouting 

63 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

to those left behind on the quay and to their fel- 
lows on the other ships. The channel was very 
tortuous; and we anchored before we had gone 
far down it, after coming within an ace of a bad 
collision with another transport. The next morn- 
ing we were all ?,gain under way, and in the after- 
noon the great fleet steamed southeast until 
Tampa Light sank in the distance. 

For the next six days we sailed steadily south- 
ward and eastward through the wonderful sap- 
phire seas of the West Indies. The thirty odd 
transports moved in long parallel lines, while 
ahead and behind and on their flanks the gray 
hulls of the war-ships surged through the blue 
water. We had every variety of craft to guard 
us, from the mighty battle-ship and swift cruiser 
to the converted yachts and the frail, venomous- 
looking torpedo-boats. The war-ships watched 
with ceaseless vigilance by day and night. When 
a sail of any kind appeared, instantly one of our 
guardians steamed toward it. Ordinarily, the tor- 
pedo-boats were towed. Once a strange ship 
steamed up too close, and instantly the nearest 
torpedo-boat was slipped like a greyhound from 
the leash, and sped across the water toward it; 
but the stranger proved harmless, and the swift, 
delicate, death-fraught craft returned again. 

It was very pleasant, sailing southward through 
64 




Transport No. 8— Yucatan, with Rough Riders on Board, off for Cuba. 



TO CUBA 

the tropic seas toward the unknown. We knew 
not whither we were bound, nor what we were to 
do; but we believed that the nearing future held 
for us many chances of death and hardship, of 
honor and renown. If we failed, we would share 
the fate of all who fail ; but we were sure that we 
would win, that we should score the first great tri- 
umph in a mighty world-movement. At night we 
looked at the new stars, and hailed the Southern 
Cross when at last we raised it above the horizon. 
In the daytime we drilled, and in the evening we 
held officers' school; but there was much time 
when we had little to do, save to scan the won- 
derful blue sea and watch the flying-fish. Toward 
evening, when the officers clustered together on 
the forward bridge, the band of the Second Infan- 
try played tune after tune, until on our quarter 
the glorious sun sunk in the red west, and, one 
by one, the lights blazed out on troop-ship and 
war-ship for miles ahead and astern, as they 
steamed onward through the brilliant tropic night. 
The men on the ship were young and strong, 
eager to face what lay hidden before them, eager 
for adventure where risk was the price of gain. 
Sometimes they talked of what they might do in 
the future, and wondered whether we were to at- 
tack Santiago or Porto Rico. At other times, as 
they lounged in groups, they told stories of their 

65 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

past — stories of the mining camps and the cattle 
ranges, of hunting bear and deer, of war-trails 
against the Indians, of lawless deeds of violence 
and the lawful violence by which they were 
avenged, of brawls in saloons, of shrewd deals in 
cattle and sheep, of successful quest for the pre- 
cious metals ; stories of brutal wrong and brutal 
appetite, melancholy love-tales, and memories of 
nameless heroes — masters of men and tamers of 
horses. 

The officers, too, had many strange experiences 
to relate ; none, not even Llewellen or O'Neill, 
had been through what was better worth telling, 
or could tell it better, than Capron. He had spent 
years among the Apaches, the wildest and fiercest 
of tribes, and again and again had owed his life 
to his own cool judgment and extraordinary per- 
sonal prowess. He knew the sign language, fa- 
miliar to all the Indians of the mountains and the 
plains; and it was curious to find that the signs 
for different animals, for water, for sleep and death, 
which he knew from holding intercourse with the 
tribes of the Southeast, were exactly like those 
which I had picked up on my occasional hunting 
or trading trips among the Sioux and Mandans 
of the North. He was a great rifle shot and wolf 
hunter, and had many tales to tell of the deeds ot 
gallant hounds and the feats of famous horses. 

66 



TO CUBA 

He had handled his Indian scouts and dealt with 
the "bronco" Indians, the renegades from the 
tribes, in circumstances of extreme peril ; for he 
had seen the sullen, moody Apaches when they 
suddenly went crazy with wolfish blood-lust, and 
in their madness wished to kill whomever was 
nearest. He knew, so far as white man could 
know, their ways of thought, and how to humor 
and divert them when on the brink of some dan- 
gerous outbreak. Capron's training and temper 
fitted him to do great work in war; and he looked 
forward with eager confidence to what the future 
held, for he was sure that for him it held either 
triumph or death. Death was the prize he drew. 
Most of the men had simple souls. They could 
relate facts, but they said very little about what 
they dimly felt. Bucky O'Neill, however, the 
iron-nerved, iron-willed fighter from Arizona, the 
Sheriff whose name was a by-word of terror to 
every wrong-doer, white or red, the gambler who 
with unmoved face would stake and lose every 
dollar he had in the world — he, alone among his 
comrades, was a visionary, an articulate emotion- 
alist. He was very quiet about it, never talking 
unless he was sure of his listeaer ; but at night, 
when we leaned on the railing to look at the 
Southern Cross, he was less apt to tell tales of 
his hard and stormy past than he was to speak of 

67 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the mysteries which lie behind courage, and fear, 
and love, behind animal hatred, and animal lust 
for the pleasures that have tangible shape. He 
had keenly enjoyed life, and he could breast its 
turbulent torrent as few men could; he was a 
practical man, who knew how to wrest personal 
success from adverse forces, among money-makers, 
politicians, and desperadoes alike ; yet, down at 
bottom, what seemed to interest him most was 
the philosophy of life itself, of our understanding 
of it, and of the limitations set to that understand- 
ing. But he was as far as possible from being a 
mere dreamer of dreams. A stanchly loyal and 
generous friend, he was also exceedingly ambi- 
tious on his own account. If, by risking his life, 
no matter how great the risk, he could gain high 
military distinction, he was bent on gaining it. 
He had taken so many chances when death lay 
on the hazard, that he felt the odds were now 
against him ; but, said he, " Who would not risk 
his life for a star ? " Had he lived, and had the 
war lasted, he would surely have won the eagle, 
if not the star. 

We had a good deal of trouble with the trans- 
ports, chiefly because they were not under the 
control of the navy. One of them was towing a 
schooner, and another a scow; both, of course, 
kept lagging behind. Finally, when we had gone 

68 



TO CUBA 

nearly the length of Cuba, the transport with the 
schooner sagged very far behind, and then our 
wretched transport was directed by General 
Shafter to fall out of line and keep her company. 
Of course, we executed the order, greatly to the 
wrath of Captain Clover, who, in the gunboat 
Bancroft, had charge of the rear of the column — 
for we could be of no earthly use to the other 
transport, and by our presence simply added just 
so much to Captain Clover's anxiety, as he had 
two transports to protect instead of one. Next 
morning the rest of the convoy were out of 
sight, but we reached them just as they finally 
turned. 

Until this we had steamed with the trade-wind 
blowing steadily in our faces ; but once we were 
well to eastward of Cuba, we ran southwest with 
the wind behind on our quarter, and we all knew 
that our destination was Santiago. On the morn- 
ing of the 20th we were close to the Cuban coast. 
High mountains rose almost from the water's edge, 
looking huge and barren across the sea. We sped 
onward past Guantanamo Bay, where we saw the 
little picket-ships of the fleet ; and in the afternoon 
we sighted Santiago Harbor, with the great war- 
ships standing off and on in front of it, gray and 
sullen in their war-paint. 

All next day we rolled and wallowed in the 
69 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

seaway, waiting until a decision was reached as to 
where we should land. On the morning of June 
22d the welcome order for landing came. 

We did the landing as we had done everything 
else — that is, in a scramble, each commander shift- 
ing for himself The port at which we landed 
was called Daiquiri, a squalid little village where 
there had been a railway and iron-works. There 
were no facilities for landing, and the fleet did 
not have a quarter the number of boats it should 
have had for the purpose. All we could do was 
to stand in with the transports as close as possible, 
and then row ashore in our own few boats and the 
boats of the war-ships. Luck favored our regi- 
ment. My former naval aide, while I was Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy, Lieutenant Sharp, was in 
command of the Vixen, a converted yacht ; and 
everything being managed on the go-as-you-please 
principle, he steamed by us and offered to help 
put us ashore. Of course, we jumped at the 
chance. Wood and I boarded the Vixen, and 
there we got Lieutenant Sharp's black Cuban 
pilot, who told us he could take our transport 
right in to within a few hundred yards of the land. 
Accordingly, we put him aboard; and in he 
brought her, gaining at least a mile and a half by 
the manoeuvre. The other transports followed; 
but we had our berth, and were all right. 

70 



TO CUBA 

There was plenty of excitement to the landing. 
In the first place, the smaller war-vessels shelled 
Daiquiri, so as to dislodge any Spaniards who 
might be lurking in the neighborhood, and also 
shelled other places along the coast, to keep the 
enemy puzzled as to our intentions. Then the 
surf was high, and the landing difficult; so that 
the task of getting the men, the ammunition, and 
provisions ashore was not easy. Each man carried 
three days' field rations and a hundred rounds of 
ammunition. Our regiment had accumulated two 
rapid-fire Colt automatic guns, the gift of Stevens, 
Kane, Titfany, and one or two others of the New 
York men, and also a dynamite gun, under the 
immediate charge of Sergeant Borrowe. To get 
these, and especially the last, ashore, involved no 
little work and hazard. Meanwhile, from another 
transport, our horses were being landed, together 
with the mules, by the simple process of throwing 
them overboard and letting them swim ashore, if 
they could. Both of Wood's got safely through. 
One of mine was drowned. The other, little 
Texas, got ashore all right. While I was super- 
intending the landing at the ruined dock, with 
Bucky O'Neill, a boatful of colored infantry sol- 
diers capsized, and two of the men went to the 
bottom ; Bucky O'Neill plunging in, in full uni- 
form, to save them, but in vain. 

71 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

However, by the late afternoon we had all our 
men, with what amm'unition and provisions they 
could themselves carry, landed, and were ready 
for anything that might turn up. 



72 



Ill 

GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT AT LAS GUASIMAS 

JUST before leaving Tampa we had been 
brigaded with the First (white) and Tenth 
(colored) Regular Cavalry under Brigadier- 
General S. B. M. Young. We were the Second 
Brigade, the First Brigade consisting of the Third 
and Sixth (white), and the Ninth (colored) Regu- 
lar Cavalry under Brigadier-General Sumner. 
The two brigades of the cavalry division were 
under Major-General Joseph Wheeler, the gal- 
lant old Confederate cavalry commander. 

General Young was — and is — as fine a type of 
the American fighting soldier as a man can hope 
to see. He had been in command, as Colonel, 
of the Yellowstone National Park, and I had seen 
a good deal of him in connection therewith, as I 
was President of the Boone and Crockett Club, 
an organization devoted to hunting big game, to 
its preservation, and to forest preservation. Dur- 
ing the preceding winter, while he was in Wash- 
ington, he had lunched with me at the Metro- 
politan Club, Wood being one of the other 

73 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

guests. Of course, we talked of the war, which 
all of us present believed to be impending, and 
Wood and I told him we were going to make 
every effort to get in, somehow ; and he answered 
that we must be sure to get into his brigade, if he 
had one, and he would guarantee to show us fight- 
ing. None of us forgot the conversation. As 
soon as our regiment was raised General Young 
applied for it to be put in his brigade. We were 
put in; and he made his word good; for he 
fought and won the first fight on Cuban soil. 

Yet, even though under him, we should not 
have been in this fight at all if we had not taken 
advantage of the chance to disembark among the 
first troops, and if it had not been for Wood's 
energy in pushing our regiment to the front. 

On landing we spent some active hours in 
marching our men a quarter of a mile or so 
inland, as boat-load by boat-load they disem- 
barked. Meanwhile one of the men, Knoblauch, 
a New Yorker, who was a great athlete and a 
champion swimmer, by diving in the surf off the 
dock, recovered most of the rifles which had been 
lost when the boat-load of colored cavalry capsized. 
The country would have offered very great diffi- 
culties to an attacking force had there been resist- 
ance. It was little but a mass of rugged and 
precipitous hills, covered for the most part by 

74 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

dense jungle. Five hundred resolute men could 
have prevented the disembarkation at very little 
cost to themselves. There had been about that 
number of Spaniards at Daiquiri that morning, 
but they had fled even before the ships began 
shelling. In their place we found hundreds of 
Cuban insurgents, a crew of as utter tatterdema- 
lions as human eyes ever looked on, armed with 
every kind of rifle in all stages of dilapidation. 
It was evident, at a glance, that they would be no 
use in serious fighting, but it was hoped that they 
might be of service in scouting. From a variety 
of causes, however, they turned out to be nearly 
useless, even for this purpose, so far as the Santi- 
ago campaign was concerned. 

We were camped on a dusty, brush-covered 
flat, with jungle on one side, and on the other a 
shallow, fetid pool fringed with palm-trees. Huge 
land-crabs scuttled noisily through the underbrush, 
exciting much interest among the men. Camp- 
ing was a simple matter, as each man carried all 
he had, and the officers had nothing. I took a 
light mackintosh and a tooth-brush. Fortunately, 
that night it did not rain; and from the palm- 
leaves we built shelters from the sun. 

General Lawton, a tall, fine-looking man, had 
taken the advance. A thorough soldier, he at 
once established outposts and pushed reconnoi- 

75 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

tring parties ahead on the trails. He had as little 
baggage as the rest of us. Our own Brigade- 
Commander, General Young, had exactly the 
same impedimenta that I had, namely, a mackin- 
tosh and a tooth-brush. 

Next morning we were hard at work trying to 
get the stuff unloaded from the ship, and suc- 
ceeded in getting most of it ashore, but were 
utterly unable to get transportation for anything 
but a very small quantity. The great shortcom- 
ing throughout the campaign was the utterly in- 
adequate transportation. If we had been allowed 
to take our mule-train, we could have kept the 
whole cavalry division supplied. 

In the afternoon word came to us to march. 
General Wheeler, a regular game-cock, was as 
anxious as Lawton to get first blood, and he was 
bent upon putting the cavalry division to the 
front as quickly as possible. Lawton's advance- 
guard was in touch with the Spaniards, and there 
had been a skirmish between the latter and some 
Cubans, who were repulsed. General Wheeler 
made a reconnoissance in person, found out where 
the enemy was, and directed General Young to 
take our brigade and move forward so as to strike 
him next morning. He had the power to do 
this, as when General Shafter was afloat he had 
command ashore. 

76 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

I had succeeded in finding Texas, my surviv- 
ing horse, much the worse for his fortnight on the 
transport and his experience in getting off, but 
still able to carry me. 

It was mid-afternoon and the topic sun was 
beating fiercely down when Colonel Wood started 
our regiment — the First and Tenth Cavalry and 
some of the infantry regiments having already 
marched. Colonel Wood himself rode in ad- 
vance, while I led my squadron, and Major 
Brodie followed with his. It was a hard march, 
the hilly jungle trail being so narrow that often 
we had to go in single file. We marched fast, 
for Wood was bound to get us ahead of the other 
regiments, so as to be sure of our place in the 
body that struck the enemy next morning. If it 
had not been for his energy in pushing forward, 
we should certainly have missed the fight. As it 
was, we did not halt until we were at the extreme 
front. 

The men were not in very good shape for 
marching, and moreover they were really horse- 
men, the majority being cowboys who had never 
done much walking. The heat was intense and 
their burdens very heavy. Yet there was very 
little straggling. Whenever we halted they 
instantly took off their packs and threw them- 
selves on their backs. Then at the word to start 

77 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

they would spring into place again. The cap- 
tains and lieutenants tramped along, encouraging 
the men by example and word. A good part ot 
the time I was by Captain Llewellen, and was 
greatly pleased to see the way in which he kept 
his men up to their work. He never pitied or 
coddled his troopers, but he always looked after 
them. He helped them whenever he could, and 
took rather more than his full share of hardship 
and danger, so that his men naturally followed 
him with entire devotion. Jack Greenway was 
under him as lieutenant, and to him the entire 
march was nothing but an enjoyable outing, the 
chance of fight on the morrow simply adding the 
needed spice of excitement. 

It was long after nightfall when we tramped 
through the darkness into the squalid coast ham- 
let of Siboney. As usual when we made a night 
camp, we simply drew the men up in column of 
troops, and then let each man lie down where he 
was. Black thunder-clouds were gathering. Be- 
fore they broke the fires were made and the men 
cooked their coffee and pork, some frying the 
hard-tack with the pork. The officers, of course, 
fared just as the men did. Hardly had we finished 
eating when the rain came, a regular tropic down- 
pour. We sat about, sheltering ourselves as best 
we could, for the hour or two it lasted; then the 

78 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

fires were relighted and we closed around them, 
the men taking off their wet things to dry them, 
so far as possible, by the blaze. 

Wood had gone off to see General Young, as 
General Wheeler had instructed General Young 
to hit the Spaniards, who were about four miles 
away, as soon after daybreak as possible. Mean- 
while I strolled over to Captain Capron's troop. 
He and I, with his two lieutenants. Day and 
Thomas, stood around the fire, together with two 
or three non-commissioned officers and privates ; 
among the latter were Sergeant Hamilton Fish 
and Trooper Elliot Cowdin, both of New York. 
Cowdin, together with two other troopers, Harry 
Thorpe and Munro Ferguson, had been on my 
Oyster Bay Polo Team some years before. 
Hamilton Fish had already shown himself one of 
the best non-commissioned officers we had. A 
huge fellow, of enormous strength and endurance 
and dauntless courage, he took naturally to a sol- 
dier's life. He never complained and never 
shirked any duty of any kind, while his power 
over his men was great. So good a sergeant had 
he made that Captain Capron, keen to get the 
best men under him, took him when he left 
Tampa — for Fish's troop remained behind. As 
we stood around the flickering blaze that night I 
caught myself admiring the splendid bodily vigor 

79 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

of Capron and Fish — the captain and the ser- 
geant. Their frames seemed of steel, to with- 
stand all fatigue ; they were flushed with health ; 
in their eyes shone high resolve and fiery desire. 
Two finer types of the fighting man, two better 
representatives of the American soldier, there were 
not in the whole army. Capron was going over 
his plans for the fight when we should meet the 
Spaniards on the morrow, Fish occasionally ask- 
ing a question. They were both filled with 
eager longing to show their mettle, and both were 
rightly confident that if they lived they would win 
honorable renown and would rise high in their 
chosen profession. Within twelve hours they 
both were dead. 

I had lain down when toward midnight Wood 
returned. He had gone over the whole plan with 
General Young. We were to start by sunrise 
toward Santiago, General Young taking four 
troops of the Tenth and four troops of the First 
up the road which led through the valley ; while 
Colonel Wood was to lead our eight troops along 
a hill-trail to the left, which joined the valley road 
about four miles on, at a point where the road 
went over a spur of the mountain chain and from 
thence went down hill toward Santiago. The 
Spaniards had their lines at the junction of the 
road and the trail. 

So 

































Brigadier-General S. B. M. Young. 





GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

Before describing our part in the fight, it is 
necessary to say a word about General Young's 
share, for, of course, the whole fight was under 
his direction, and the fight on the right wing un- 
der his immediate supervision. General Young 
had obtained from General Castillo, the com- 
mander of the Cuban forces, a full description of 
the country in front. General Castillo promised 
Young the aid of eight hundred Cubans, if he 
made a reconnoissance in force to find out exactly 
what the Spanish strength was. This promised 
Cuban aid did not, however, materialize, the 
Cubans, who had been beaten back by the Span- 
iards the day before, not appearing on the firing- 
line until the fight was over. 

General Young had in his immediate command 
a squadron of the First Regular Cavalry, two hun- 
dred and forty-four strong, under the command of 
Major Bell, and a squadron of the Tenth Regular 
Cavalry, two hundred and twenty strong, under 
the command of Major Norvell. He also had 
two Hotchkiss mountain guns, under Captain 
Watson of the Tenth. He started at a quarter 
before six in the morning, accompanied by Cap- 
tain A. L. Mills, as aide. It was at half-past 
seven that Captain Mills, with a patrol of two 
men in advance, discovered the Spaniards as they 
lay across where the two roads came together, 

8i 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

some of them in pits, others simply lying in the 
heavy jungle, while on their extreme right they 
occupied a big ranch. Where General Young 
struck them they held a high ridge a little to the 
left of his front, this ridge being separated by a 
deep ravine from the hill-trail still farther to the 
left, down which the Rough Riders were advanc- 
ing. That is, their forces occupied a range of 
high hills in the form of an obtuse angle, the sa- 
lient being toward the space between the Ameri- 
can forces, while there were advance parties along 
both roads. There were stone breastworks flanked 
by block-houses on that part of the ridge where 
the two trails came together. The place was 
called Las Guasimas, from trees of that name in 
the neighborhood. 

General Young, who was riding a mule, care- 
fully examined the Spanish position in person. 
He ordered the canteens of the troops to be filled, 
placed the Hotchkiss battery in concealment 
about nine hundred yards from the Spanish lines, 
and then deployed the white regulars, with the 
colored regulars in support, having sent a Cuban 
guide to try to find Colonel Wood and warn him. 
He did not attack immediately, because he knew 
that Colonel Wood, having a more difficult route, 
would require a longer time to reach the position. 
During the delay General Wheeler arrived ; he 

82 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

had been up since long before dawn, to see that 
everything went well. Young informed him of 
the dispositions and plan of attack, he made. 
General Wheeler approved of them, and with ex- 
cellent judgment left General Young a free hand 
to fight his battle. 

So, about eight o'clock Young began the fight 
with his Hotchkiss guns, he himself being up on 
the firing-line. No sooner had the Hotchkiss 
one-pounders opened than the Spaniards opened 
fire in return, most of the time firing by volleys 
executed in perfect time, almost as on parade. 
They had a couple of light guns, which our peo- 
ple thought were quick firers. The denseness of 
the jungle and the fact that they used absolutely 
smokeless powder, made it exceedingly difficult 
to place exactly where they were, and almost im- 
mediately Young, who always liked to get as 
close as possible to his enemy, began to push his 
troops forward. They were deployed on both 
sides of the road in such thick jungle that it was 
only here and there that they could possibly see 
ahead, and some confusion, of course, ensued, the 
support gradually getting mixed with the ad- 
vance. Captain Beck took A Troop of the 
Tenth in on the left, next Captain Galbraith's 
troop of the First; two other troops of the Tenth 
were on the extreme right. Through the jungle 

83 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ran wire fences here and there, and as the troops 
got to the ridge they encountered precipitous 
heights. They were led most gallantly, as Ameri- 
can regular officers always lead their men ; and the 
men followed their leaders with the splendid cour- 
age always shown by the American regular sol- 
dier. There was not a single straggler among 
them, and in not one instance was an attempt 
made by any trooper to fall out in order to assist 
the wounded or carry back the dead, while so 
cool were they and so perfect their fire discipline, 
that in the entire engagement the expenditure of 
ammunition was not over ten rounds per man. 
Major Bell, who commanded the squadron, had 
his leg broken by a shot as he was leading his 
men. Captain Wainwright succeeded to the 
command of the squadron. Captain Knox was 
shot in the abdomen. He continued for some 
time giving orders to his troops, and refused to 
allow a man in the firing-line to assist him to the 
rear. His First Lieutenant, Byram, was himself 
shot, but continued to lead his men until the 
wound and the heat overcame him and he fell in a 
faint. The advance was pushed forward under 
General Young's eye with the utmost energy, 
until the enemy's voices could be heard in the 
entrenchments. The Spaniards kept up a very 
heavy firing, but the regulars would not be de- 

84 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

nied, and as they climbed the ridges the Spaniards 
broke and fled. 

Meanwhile, at six o'clock, the Rough Riders 
began their advance. We first had to climb a 
very steep hill. Many of the men, foot-sore and 
weary from their march of the preceding day, 
found the pace up this hill too hard, and either 
dropped their bundles or fell out of line, with the 
result that we went into action with less than five 
hundred men — as, in addition to the stragglers, a 
detachment had been left to guard the baggage 
on shore. At the time I was rather inclined to 
grumble to myself about Wood setting so fast a 
pace, but when the fight began I realized that it 
had been absolutely necessary, as otherwise we 
should have arrived late and the regulars would 
have had very hard work indeed. 

Tiffany, by great exertions, had corralled a 
couple of mules and was using them to transport 
the Colt automatic guns in the rear of the regi- 
ment. The dynamite gun was not with us, as 
mules for it could not be obtained in time. 

Captain Capron's troop was in the lead, it being 
chosen for the most responsible and dangerous 
position because of Capron's capacity. Four men, 
headed by Sergeant Hamilton Fish, went first; a 
support of twenty men followed some distance 
behind ; and then came Capron and the rest of his 

85 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

troop, followed by Wood, with whom General 
Young had sent Lieutenants Smedburg and 
Rivers as aides. I rode close behind, at the head 
of the other three troops of my squadron, and 
then came Brodie at the head of his squadron. 
The trail was so narrow that for the most part the 
men marched in single file, and it was bordered 
by dense, tangled jungle, through which a man 
could with difficulty force his way ; so that to put 
out flankers was impossible, for they could not 
possibly have kept up with the march of the col- 
umn. Every man had his canteen full. There 
was a Cuban guide at the head of the column, 
but he ran away as soon as the fighting began. 
There were also with us, at the head of the col- 
umn, two men who did not run away, who, though 
non-combatants — newspaper correspondents — 
showed as much gallantry as any soldier in the 
field. They were Edward Marshall and Richard 
Harding Davis. 

After reaching the top of the hill the walk was 
very pleasant. Now and then we came to glades 
or rounded hill-shoulders, whence we could look 
off for some distance. The tropical forest was 
very beautiful, and it was a delight to see the 
strange trees, the splendid royal palms and a tree 
which looked like a flat-topped acacia, and which 
was covered with a mass of brilliant scarlet flow- 

86 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

ers. We heard many bird-notes, too, the cooing 
of doves and the call of a great brush cuckoo. 
Afterward we found that the Spanish guerillas im- 
itated these bird-calls, but the sounds we heard 
that morning, as we advanced through the tropic 
forest, were from birds, not guerillas, until we came 
right up to the Spanish lines. It was very beau- 
tiful and very peaceful, and it seemed more as if 
we were off on some hunting excursion than as if 
we were about to go into a sharp and bloody lit- 
tle fight. 

Of course, we accommodated our movements 
to those of the men in front. After marching for 
somewhat over an hour, we suddenly came to a 
halt, and immediately afterward Colonel Wood 
sent word down the line that the advance guard 
had come upon a Spanish outpost. Then the 
order was passed to fill the magazines, which was 
done. 

The men were totally unconcerned, and I do 
not think they realized that any fighting was at 
hand ; at any rate, I could hear the group nearest 
me discussing in low murmurs, not the Spaniards, 
but the conduct of a certain cow-puncher in quit- 
ting work on a ranch and starting a saloon in 
some New Mexican town. In another minute, 
however. Wood sent me orders to deploy three 
troops to the right of the trail, and to advance 

87 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

when we became engaged; while, at the same 
time, the other troops, under Major Brodie, were 
deployed to the left of the trail where the ground 
was more open than elsewhere — one troop being 
held in reserve in the centre, besides the reserves 
on each wing. Later all the reserves were put 
into the firing-line. 

To the right the jungle was quite thick, and 
we had barely begun to deploy when a crash in 
front announced that the fight was on. It was 
evidently very hot, and L Troop had its hands 
full ; so I hurried my men up abreast of them. 
So thick was the jungle that it was very difficult 
to keep together, especially when there was no 
time for delay, and while I got up Llewellen's 
troops and Kane's platoon of K Troop, the rest of 
K Troop under Captain Jenkins which, with 
Bucky O'Neill's troop, made up the right wing, 
were behind, and it was some time before they 
got into the fight at all. 

Meanwhile I had gone forward with Llewellen, 
Greenway, Kane and their troopers until we came 
out on a kind of shoulder, jutting over a ravine, 
which separated us from a great ridge on our right. 
It was on this ridge that the Spaniards had some 
of their intrenchments, and it was just beyond this 
ridge that the Valley Road led, up which the 
regulars were at that very time pushing their at- 











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GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

tack; but, of course, at the moment we knew 
nothing of this. The effect of the smokeless 
powder was remarkable. The air seemed full of 
the rustling sound of the Mauser bullets, for the 
Spaniards knew the trails by which we were ad- 
vancing, and opened heavily on our position. 
Moreover, as we advanced we were, of course, 
exposed, and they could see us and fire. But 
they themselves were entirely invisible. The 
jungle covered everything, and not the faintest 
trace of smoke was to be seen in any direction to 
indicate from whence the bullets came. It was 
some time before the men fired ; Llewellen, Kane, 
and I anxiously studying the ground to see where 
our opponents were, and utterly unable to find 
out. 

We could hear the faint reports of the Hotch- 
kiss guns and the reply of two Spanish guns, and 
the Mauser bullets were singing through the trees 
over our heads, making a noise like the humming 
of telephone wires ; but exactly where they came 
from we could not tell. The Spaniards were 
firing high and for the most part by volleys, and 
their shooting was not very good, which perhaps 
was not to be wondered at, as they were a long 
way off Gradually, however, they began to get 
the range and occasionally one of our men would 
crumple up. In no case did the man make any 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

outcry when hit, seeming to take it as a matter of 
course ; at the outside, making only such a remark 
as, " Well, I got it that time." With hardly an 
exception, there was no sign of flinching. I say 
with hardly an exception, for though I personally 
did not see an instance, and though all the men 
at the front behaved excellently, yet there were a 
very few men who lagged behind and drifted 
back to the trail over which we had come. The 
character of the fight put a premium upon such 
conduct, and afforded a very severe test for raw 
troops; because the jungle was so dense that as 
we advanced in open order, every man was, from 
time to time, left almost alone and away from the 
eyes of his officers. There was unlimited oppor- 
tunity for dropping out without attracting notice, 
while it was peculiarly hard to be exposed to the 
fire of an unseen foe, and to see men dropping 
under it, and yet to be, for some time, unable to 
return it, and also to be entirely ignorant of what 
was going on in any other part of the field. 

It was Richard Harding Davis who gave us 
our first opportunity to shoot back with effect. 
He was behaving precisely like my officers, being 
on the extreme front of the line, and taking every 
opportunity to study with his glasses the ground 
where we thought the Spaniards were. I had 
tried some volley firing at points where I rather 

go 




GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

doubtfully believed the Spaniards to be, but had 
stopped firing and was myself studying the jun- 
gle-covered mountain ahead with my glasses, 
when Davis suddenly said: "There they are. 
Colonel; look over there; I can see their hats 
near that glade," pointing across the valley to our 
right. In a minute I, too, made out the hats, 
and then pointed them out to three or four of our 
best shots, giving them my estimate of the range. 
For a minute or two no result followed, and I 
kept raising the range, at the same time getting 
more men on the firing-line. Then, evidently, 
the shots told, for the Spaniards suddenly sprang 
out of the cover through which we had seen their 
hats, and ran to another spot; and we could now 
make out a large number of them. 

I accordingly got all of my men up in line and 
began quick firing. In a very few minutes our 
bullets began to do damage, for the Spaniards re- 
treated to the left into the jungle, and we lost 
sight of them. At the same moment a big body 
of men who, it afterward turned out, were Span- 
iards, came in sight along the glade, following the 
retreat of those whom we had just driven from 
the trenches. We supposed that there was a 
large force of Cubans with General Young, not 
being aware that these Cubans had failed to make 
their appearance, and as it was impossible to tell 

91 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the Cubans from the Spaniards, and as we could 
not decide whether these were Cubans following 
the Spaniards we had put to flight, or merely an- 
other troop of Spaniards retreating after the first 
(which was really the case) we dared not fire, and 
in a minute they had passed the glade and were 
out of sight. 

At every halt we took advantage of the cover, 
sinking down behind any mound, bush, or tree- 
trunk in the neighborhood. The trees, of course, 
furnished no protection from the Mauser bullets. 
Once I was standing behind a large palm with 
my head out to one side, very fortunately; for a 
bullet passed through the palm, filling my left 
eye and ear with the dust and splinters. 

No man was allowed to drop out to help the 
wounded. It was hard to leave them there in the 
jungle, where they might not be found again until 
the vultures and the land-crabs came, but war is a 
grim game and there was no choice. One of the 
men shot was Harry Heffner of G Troop, who 
was mortally wounded through the hips. He fell 
without uttering a sound, and two of his compan- 
ions dragged him behind a tree. Here he propped 
himself up and asked to be given his canteen and 
his rifle, which I handed to him. He then again 
began shooting, and continued loading and firing 
until the line moved forward and we left him 

92 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

alone, dying in the gloomy shade. When we 
found him again, after the fight, he was dead. 

At one time, as I was out of touch with that 
part of my wing commanded by Jenkins and 
O'Neill, I sent Greenway, with Sergeant Russell, 
a New Yorker, and trooper Rowland, a New 
Mexican cow-puncher, down in the valley to find 
out where they were. To do this the three had 
to expose themselves to a very severe fire, but 
they were not men to whom this mattered. Rus- 
sell was killed ; the other two returned and re- 
ported to me the position of Jenkins and O'Neill. 
They then resumed their places on the firing-line. 
After awhile I noticed blood coming out of Row- 
land's side and discovered that he had been shot, 
although he did not seem to be taking any notice 
of it. He said the wound was only slight, but as 
I saw he had broken a rib, I told him to go to the 
rear to the hospital. After some grumbling he 
went, but fifteen minutes later he was back on the 
firing-line again and said he could not find the 
hospital — which I doubted. However, I then let 
him stay until the end of the fight. 

After we had driven the Spaniards off from 
their position to our right, the firing seemed to 
die away so far as we were concerned, for the bul- 
lets no longer struck around us in such a storm as 
before, though along the rest of the line the battle 

93 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

was as brisk as ever. Soon we saw troops ap- 
pearing across the ravine, not very far from where 
we had seen the Spaniards whom we had thought 
might be Cubans. Again we dared not fire, and 
carefully studied the new-comers with our glasses ; 
and this time we were right, for we recognized 
our own cavalry-men. We were by no means 
sure that they recognized us, however, and were 
anxious that they should, but it was very difficult 
to find a clear spot in the jungle from which to 
signal; so Sergeant Lee of Troop K climbed a 
tree and from its summit waved the troop guidon. 
They waved their guidon back, and as our right 
wing was now in touch with the regulars, I left 
Jenkins and O'Neill to keep the connection, and 
led Llewellen's troop back to the path to join the 
rest of the regiment, which was evidently still in 
the thick of the fight. I was still very much in 
the dark as to where the main body of the Span- 
ish forces were, or exactly what lines the battle 
was following, and was very uncertain what I 
ought to do ; but I knew it could not be wrong 
to go forward, and I thought I would find Wood 
and then see what he wished me to do. I was in 
a mood- to cordially welcome guidance, for it was 
most bewildering to fight an enemy whom one so 
rarely saw. 

I had not seen Wood since the beginning of 
94 







Hamilluii Fish, Jr., First Serjjeant, Troop L, 

Killed in battle at Las Guasimas. 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

the skirmish, when he hurried forward. When 
the firing opened some of the men began to curse. 
" Don't swear — shoot ! " growled Wood, as he 
strode along the path leading his horse, and every- 
one laughed and became cool again. The Spanish 
outposts were very near our advance guard, and 
some minutes of the hottest kind of firing followed 
before they were driven back and slipped off 
through the jungle to their main lines in the rear. 
Here, at the very outset of our active service, 
we suffered the loss of two as gallant men as ever 
wore uniform. Sergeant Hamilton Fish at the 
extreme front, while holding the point up to its 
work and firing back where the Spanish advance 
guards lay, was shot and instantly killed; three 
of the men with him were likewise hit. Captain 
Capron, leading the advance guard in person, and 
displaying equal courage and coolness in the way 
that he handled them, was also struck, and died a 
few minutes afterward. The command of the 
troop then devolved upon the First Lieutenant, 
young Thomas. Like Capron, Thomas was the 
fifth in line from father to son who had served in 
the American army, though in his case it was in 
the volunteer and not the regular service ; the four 
preceding generations had furnished soldiers re- 
spectively to the Revolutionary War, the War of 
1812, the Mexican War, and the Civil War. In 

95 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

a few minutes Thomas was shot through the leg, 
and the command devolved upon the Second 
Lieutenant, Day (a nephew of "Albemarle" 
Gushing, he who sunk the great Confederate ram). 
Day, who proved himself to be one of our most 
efficient officers, continued to handle the men to 
the best possible advantage, and brought them 
steadily forward. L Troop was from the Indian 
Territory. The whites, Indians, and half-breeds 
in it, all fought with equal courage. Captain 
McClintock was hurried forward to its relief 
with his Troop B of Arizona men. In a few 
minutes he was shot through the leg and his place 
was taken by his First Lieutenant, Wilcox, who 
handled his men in the same soldierly manner 
that Day did. 

Among the men who showed marked courage 
and coolness was the tall color-sergeant, Wright ; 
the colors were shot through three times. 

When I had led G Troop back to the trail I 
ran ahead of them, passing the dead and wounded 
men of L Troop, passing young Fish as he lay 
with glazed eyes under the rank tropic growth to 
one side of the trail. When I came to the front 
I found the men spread out in a very thin skir- 
mish line, advancing through comparatively open 
ground, each man taking advantage of what cover 
he could, while Wood strolled about leading his 

96 




Major Brodie, 

Wounded in the Guasimas Fight. 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

horse, Brodie being close at hand. How Wood 
escaped being hit, I do not see, and still less how 
his horse escaped. I had left mine at the begin- 
ning of the action, and was only regretting that I 
had not left my sword with it, as it kept getting 
between my legs when I was tearing my way 
through the jungle. I never wore it again in 
action. Lieutenant Rivers was with Wood, also 
leading his horse. Smedburg had been sent off 
on the by no means pleasant task of establishing 
communications with Young. 

Very soon after I reached the front, Brodie was 
hit, the bullet shattering one arm and whirling 
him around as he stood. He had kept on the 
extreme front all through, his presence and exam- 
ple keeping his men entirely steady, and he at first 
refused to go to the rear; but the wound was very 
painful, and he became so faint that he had to be 
sent. Thereupon, Wood directed me to take 
charge of the left wing in Brodie's place, and to 
bring it forward ; so over I went. 

I now had under me Captains Luna, Muller, 
and Houston, and I began to take them forward, 
well spread out, through the high grass of a rather 
open forest. I noticed Goodrich, of Houston's 
troop, tramping along behind his men, absorbed 
in making them keep at good intervals from one 
another and fire slowly with careful aim. As I 

97 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

came close up to the edge of the troop, he caught 
a glimpse of me, mistook me for one of his own 
skirmishers who was crowding in too closely, and 
called out, "Keep your interval, sir; keep your 
interval, and go forward." 

A perfect hail of bullets was sweeping over us 
as we advanced. Once I got a glimpse of some 
Spaniards, apparently retreating, far in the front, 
and to our right, and we fired a couple of rounds 
after them. Then I became convinced, after 
much anxious study, that we were being fired at 
from some large red-tiled buildings, part of a 
ranch on our front. Smokeless powder, and the 
thick cover in our front, continued to puzzle us, 
and I more than once consulted anxiously the 
ofBcers as to the exact whereabouts of our oppo- 
nents. I took a rifle from a wounded man and 
began to try shots with it myself It was very 
hot and the men were getting exhausted, though 
at this particular time we were not suffering 
heavily from bullets, the Spanish fire going high. 
As we advanced, the cover became a little thicker 
and I lost touch of the main body under Wood ; 
so I halted and we fired industriously at the ranch 
buildings ahead of us, some five hundred yards 
off. Then we heard cheering on the right, and I 
supposed that this meant a charge on the part of 
Wood's men, so I sprang up and ordered the men 

98 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

to rush the buildings ahead of us. They came 
forward with a will. There was a moment's 
heavy firing from the Spaniards, which all went 
over our heads, and then it ceased entirely. 
When we arrived at the buildings, panting and 
out of breath, they contained nothing but heaps 
of empty cartridge-shells and two dead Spaniards, 
shot through the head. 

The country all around us was thickly forested, 
so that it was very difficult to see any distance in 
any direction. The firing had now died out, but 
I was still entirely uncertain as to exactly what 
had happened. I did not know whether the ene- 
my had been driven back or whether it was 
merely a lull in the fight, and we might be at- 
tacked again ; nor did I know what had happened 
in any other part of the line, while as I occupied 
the extreme left, I was not sure whether or not 
my flank was in danger. At this moment one of 
our men who had dropped out, arrived with the 
information (fortunately false) that Wood was 
dead. Of course, this meant that the command 
devolved upon me, and I hastily set about taking 
charge of the regiment. I had been particularly 
struck by the coolness and courage shown by Ser- 
geants Dame and Mcllhenny, and sent them out 
with small pickets to keep watch in front and to 
the left of the left wing. I sent other men to 

99 



.r •^. 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

fill the canteens with water, and threw the rest 
out in a long line in a disused sunken road, which 
gave them cover, putting two or three wounded 
men, who had hitherto kept up with the fighting- 
line, and a dozen men who were suffering from 
heat exhaustion — for the fighting and running 
under that blazing sun through the thick dry jun- 
gle was heart-breaking — into the ranch buildings. 
Then I started over toward the main body, but 
to my delight encountered Wood himself, who 
told me the fight was over and the Spaniards had 
retreated. He also informed me that other troops 
were just coming up. The first to appear was a 
squadron of the Ninth Cavalry, under Major 
Dimick, which had hurried up to get into the 
fight, and was greatly disappointed to find it over. 
They took post in front of our lines, so that our 
tired men were able to get a rest, Captain Mc- 
Blain, of the Ninth, good-naturedly giving us 
some points as to the best way to station our out- 
posts. Then General Chaflfee, rather glum at not 
having been in the fight himself, rode up at the 
head of some of his infantry, and I marched my 
squadron back to where the rest of the regiment 
was going into camp, just where the two trails 
came together, and beyond — that is, on the Santi- 
ago side of — the original Spanish lines. 

The Rough Riders had lost eight men killed 

lOO 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

and thirty-four wounded, aside from two or three 
who were merely scratched and whose wounds 
were not reported. The First Cavahy, white, 
lost seven men killed and eight wounded; the 
Tenth Cavalry, colored, one man killed and ten 
wounded; so, out of 964 men engaged on our 
side, 16 were killed and 52 wounded. The 
Spaniards were under General Rubin, with, as 
second in command. Colonel Alcarez. They had 
two guns, and eleven companies of about a hun- 
dred men each: three belonging to the Porto 
Rico regiment, three to the San Fernandino, two 
to the Talavero, two being so-called mobilized 
companies from the mineral districts, and one a 
company of engineers ; over twelve hundred men 
in all, together with two guns.* 

General Rubin reported that he had repulsed 
the American attack, and Lieutenant Tejeiro 

*See Lieutenant MUller y Tejeiro, "Combates y Capitulacion de 
Santiago de Cuba," page 136. The Lieutenant speaks as if only one 
echelon, of seven companies and two guns, was engaged on the 24th. 
The official report says distinctly, "General Rubin's column," which 
consisted of the companies detailed above. By turning to page 146, 
where Lieutenant Tejeiro enumerates the strength of the various com- 
panies, it will be seen that they averaged over no men apiece ; this 
probably does not include officers, and is probably an under-statement 
anyhow. On page 261 he makes the Spanish loss at Las Guasimas, 
which he calls Sevilla, 9 killed and 27 wounded. Very possibly he 
includes only the Spanish regulars ; two of the Spaniards we slew, 
over on the left, were in brown, instead of the light blue of the regu- 
lars, and were doubtless guerillas. 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

states in his book that General Rubin forced the 
Americans to retreat, and enumerates the attack- 
ing force as consisting of three regular regiments 
of infantry, the Second Massachusetts and the 
Seventy-first New York (not one of which fired 
a gun or were anywhere near the battle), in ad- 
dition to the sixteen dismounted troops of cav- 
alry. In other words, as the five infantry regi- 
ments each included twelve companies, he makes 
the attacking force consist of just five times the 
actual amount. As for the "repulse," our line 
never went back ten yards in any place, and the 
advance was practically steady; while an hour 
and a half after the fight began we were in com- 
plete possession of the entire Spanish position, 
and their troops were fleeing in masses down the 
road, our men being too exhausted to follow 
them. 

General Rubin also reports that he lost but 
seven men killed. This is certainly incorrect, for 
Captain O'Neill and I went over the ground very 
carefully and counted eleven dead Spaniards, all 
of whom were actually buried by our burying 
squads. There were probably two or three men 
whom we missed, but I think that our official re- 
ports are incorrect in stating that forty-two dead 
Spaniards were found ; this being based upon re- 
ports in which I think some of the Spanish dead 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

were counted two or three times. Indeed, I 
should doubt whether their loss was as heavy as 
ours, for they were under cover, while we ad- 
vanced, often in the open, and their main lines 
fled long before we could get to close quarters. 
It was a very difficult country, and a force of 
good soldiers resolutely handled could have held 
the pass with ease against -two or three times their 
number. As it was, with a force half of regulars 
and half of volunteers, we drove out a superior 
number of Spanish regular troops, strongly posted, 
without suffering a very heavy loss. Although 
the Spanish fire was very heavy, it does not seem 
to me it was very well directed ; and though they 
fired with great spirit while we merely stood at a 
distance and fired at them, they did not show 
much resolution, and when we advanced, always 
went back long before there was any chance of 
our coming into contact with them. Our men 
behaved very well indeed — white regulars, colored 
regulars, and Rough Riders alike. The newspa- 
per press failed to do full justice to the white 
regulars, in my opinion, from the simple reason 
that everybody knew that they would fight, where- 
as there had been a good deal of question as to 
how the Rough Riders, who were volunteer troops, 
and the Tenth Cavalry, who were colored, would 
behave; so there was a tendency to exalt our 

103 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

deeds at the expense of those of the First Regu- 
lars, whose courage and good conduct were taken 
for granted. It was a trying fight beyond what 
the losses show, for it is hard upon raw soldiers 
to be pitted against an unseen foe, and to ad- 
vance steadily when their comrades are falling 
around them, and when they can only occasion- 
ally see a chance to retaliate. Wood's experience 
in fighting Apaches stood him in good stead. An 
entirely raw man at the head of the regiment, 
conducting, as Wood was, what was practically 
an independent fight, would have been in a very 
tiying position. The fight cleared the way tow- 
ard Santiago, and we experienced no further re- 
sistance. 

That afternoon we made camp and dined, sub- 
sisting chiefly on a load of beans which we found 
on one of the Spanish mules which had been 
shot. We also looked after the wounded. Dr. 
Church had himself gone out to the firing-line 
during the fight, and carried to the rear some of 
the worst wounded on his back or in his arms. 
Those who could walk had walked in to where 
the little field-hospital of the regiment was estab- 
lished on the trail. We found all our dead and 
all the badly wounded. Around one of the lat- 
ter the big, hideous land-crabs had gathered in a 
grewsome ring, waiting for life to be extinct. 

104 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

One of our own men and most of the Spanish 
dead had been found by the vultures before we 
got to them ; and their bodies were mangled, the 
eyes and wounds being torn. 

The Rough Rider who had been thus treated 
was in Bucky O'Neill's troop ; and as we looked 
at the body, O'Neill turned to me and asked, 
"Colonel, isn't it Whitman who says of the 
vultures that ' they pluck the eyes of princes and 
tear the flesh of kings ' ? " I answered that I could 
not place the quotation. Just a week afterward 
we were shielding his own body from the birds 
of prey. 

One of the men who fired first, and who dis- 
played conspicuous gallantry was a Cherokee half- 
breed, who was hit seven times, and of course 
had to go back to the States. Before he rejoined 
us at Montauk Point he had gone through a 
little private war of his own ; for on his return 
he found that a cow-boy had gone off with his 
sweetheart, and in the fight that ensued he shot 
his rival. Another man of L Troop who also 
showed marked gallantry was Elliot Cowdin. 
The men of the plains and mountains were trained 
by life-long habit to look on life and death with 
iron philosophy. As I passed by a couple of 
tall, lank, Oklahoma cow-punchers, I heard one 
say, " Well, some of the boys got it in the 

105 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

neck I " to which the other answered with the 
grim plains proverb of the South : " Many a 
good horse dies." 

Thomas Isbell, a half-breed Cherokee in the 
squad under Hamilton Fish, was among the first 
to shoot and be shot at. He was wounded no 
less than seven times. The first wound was 
received by him two minutes after he had fired 
his first shot, the bullet going through his 
neck. The second hit him in the left thumb. 
The third struck near his right hip, passing 
entirely through the body. The fourth bullet 
(which was apparently from a Remington and 
not from a Mauser) went into his neck and 
lodged against the bone, being afterward cut 
out. The fifth bullet again hit his left hand. 
The sixth scraped his head and the seventh his 
neck. He did not receive all of the wounds 
at the same time, over half an hour elapsing be- 
tween the first and the last. Up to receiving 
the last wound he had declined to leave the fir- 
ing-line, but by that time he had lost so much 
blood that he had to be sent to the rear. The 
man's wiry toughness was as notable as his cour- 
age. 

We improvised litters, and carried the more 
sorely wounded back to Siboney that afternoon 
and the next morning ; the others walked. One 

1 06 







Helping a Wounded Roui;li Rider to tiie Rear after tlie Guasimas FiglU. 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

of the men who had been most severely wounded 
was Edward Marshall, the correspondent, and he 
showed as much heroism as any soldier in the 
whole army. He was shot through the spine, a 
terrible and very painful wound, which we sup- 
posed meant that he would surely die; but he 
made no complaint of any kind, and while he 
retained consciousness persisted in dictating the 
story of the fight. A very touching incident 
happened in the improvised open-air hospital 
after the fight, where the wounded were lying. 
They did not groan, and made no complaint, try- 
ing to help one another. One of them suddenly 
began to hum, " My Country 'tis of Thee," and 
one by one the others joined in the chorus, which 
swelled out through the tropic woods, where the 
victors lay in camp beside their dead. I did not 
see any sign among the fighting men, whether 
wounded or unwounded, of the very complicated 
emotions assigned to their kind by some of the 
realistic modern novelists who have written about 
battles. At the front everyone behaved quite 
simply and took things as they came, in a matter- 
of-course way; but there was doubtless, as is 
always the case, a good deal of panic and confu- 
sion in the rear where the wounded, the strag- 
glers, a few of the packers, and two or three 
newspaper correspondents were, and in conse- 

107 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

quence the first reports sent back to the coast were 
of a most alarming character, describing, with mi- 
nute inaccuracy, how we had run into an ambush, 
etc. The packers with the mules which carried 
the rapid-fire guns were among those who ran, and 
they let the mules go in the jungle ; in consequence 
the guns were never even brought to the firing- 
line, and only Fred Herrig's skill as a trailer en- 
abled us to recover them. By patient work he fol- 
lowed up the mules' tracks in the forest until he 
found the animals. 

Among the wounded who walked to the tem- 
porary hospital at Siboney was the trooper, Row- 
land, of whom I spoke before. There the doc- 
tors examined him, and decreed that his wound 
was so serious that he must go back to the States. 
This was enough for Rowland, who waited until 
nightfall and then escaped, slipping out of the 
window and making his way back to camp with 
his rifle and pack, though his wound must have 
made all movement very painful to him. After 
this, we felt that he was entitled to stay, and he 
never left us for a day, distinguishing himself 
again in the fight at San Juan. 

Next morning we buried seven dead Rough 
Riders in a grave on the summit of the trail, 
Chaplain Brown reading the solemn burial service 
of the Episcopalians, while the men stood around 

io8 




The Spot where Seven Rough Riders were Buried after the First Day's Fight at 

Las Guasimas. 



>\ 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

with bared heads and joined in singing, "Rock 
of Ages." Vast numbers of vultures were wheel- 
ing round and round in great circles through the 
blue sky overhead. There could be no more 
honorable burial than that of these men in a com- 
mon grave — Indian and cow-boy, miner, packer, 
and college athlete — the man of unknown ances- 
try from the lonely Western plains, and the man 
who carried on his watch the crests of the Stuyve- 
sants and the Fishes, one in the way they had 
met death, just as during life they had been one 
in their daring and their loyalty. 

On the afternoon of the 25th we moved on a 
couple of miles, and camped in a marshy open 
spot close to a beautiful stream. Here we lay for 
several days. Captain Lee, the British attache, 
spent some time with us; we had begun to regard 
him as almost a member of the regiment. Count 
von Gotzen, the German attache, another good 
fellow, also visited us. General Young was 
struck down with the fever, and Wood took 
charge of the brigade. This left me in com- 
mand of the regiment, of which I was very glad, 
for such experience as we had had is a quick 
teacher. By this time the men and I knew one 
another, and I felt able to make them do them- 
selves justice in march or battle. They under- 
stood diat I paid no heed to where they came 

109 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

from; no heed to their creed, politics, or social 
standing; that I would care for them to the 
utmost of my power, but that I demanded the 
highest performance of duty; while in return I 
had seen them tested, and knew I could depend 
absolutely on their courage, hardihood, obedience, 
and individual initiative. 

There was nothing like enough transportation 
with the army, whether in the way of wagops or 
mule-trains; exactly as there had been no suffi- 
cient number of landing-boats with the transports. 
The officers' baggage had come up, but none of 
us had much, and the shelter-tents proved only a 
partial protection against the terrific downpours 
of rain. These occurred almost every afternoon, 
and turned the camp into a tarn, and the trails 
into torrents and quagmires. We were not given 
quite the proper amount of food, and what we 
did get, like most of the clothing issued us, was 
fitter for the Klondyke than for Cuba. We got 
enough salt port and hardtack for the men, but 
not the full ration of coffee and sugar, and nothing 
else. I organized a couple of expeditions back to 
the seacoast, taking the strongest and best walkers 
and also some of the officers' horses and a stray 
mule or two, and brought back beans and canned 
tomatoes. These I got partly by great exertions 
on my part, and partly by the aid of Colonel 



GENERAL YOUNG'S FIGHT 

Weston of the Commissary Department, a par- 
ticularly energetic man whose services were ot 
great value. A silly regulation forbade my pur- 
chasing canned vegetables, etc., except for the of- 
ficers; and I had no little difficulty in getting 
round this regulation, and purchasing (with my 
own money, of course) what I needed for the 
men. 

One of the men I took with me on one of these 
trips was Sherman Bell, the former Deputy Mar- 
shal of Cripple Creek, and Wells-Fargo Express 
rider. In coming home with his load, through a 
blinding storm, he slipped and opened the old 
rupture. The agony was very great and one of 
his comrades took his load. He himself, some- 
times walking, and sometimes crawling, got back 
to camp, where Dr. Church fixed him up with a 
spike bandage, but informed him that he would 
have to be sent back to the States when an am- 
bulance came along. The ambulance did not 
come until the next day, which was the day be- 
fore we marched to San Juan. It arrived after 
nightfall, and as soon as Bell heard it coming, he 
crawled out of the hospital tent into the jungle, 
where he lay all night; and the ambulance went 
off without him. The men shielded him just as 
school-boys would shield a companion, carrying 
his gun, belt, and bedding; while Bell kept out 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

of sight until the column started, and then stag- 
gered along behind it. I found him the morning 
of the San Juan fight. He told me that he wanted 
to die fighting, if die he must, and I hadn't the 
heart to send him back. He did splendid service 
that day, and afterward in the trenches, and though 
the rupture opened twice again, and on each oc- 
casion he was within a hair's breadth of death, he 
escaped, and came back with us to the United 
States. 

The army was camped along the valley, ahead 
of and behind us, our outposts being established 
on either side. From the generals to the privates 
all were eager to march against Santiago. At 
daybreak, when the tall palms began to show 
dimly through the rising mist, the scream of the 
cavalry trumpets tore the tropic dawn; and in the 
evening, as the bands of regiment after regiment 
played the "Star-Spangled Banner," all, officers 
and men alike, stood with heads uncovered, wher- 
ever they were, until the last strains of the anthem 
died away in the hot sunset air. 



lis 



IV 

THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

ON June 30th we received orders to hold our- 
selves in readiness to march against Santi- 
ago, and all the men were greatly over- 
joyed, for the inaction was trying. The one 
narrow road, a mere muddy track along which 
the army was encamped, was choked with the 
marching columns. As always happened when 
we had to change camp, everything that the men 
could not carry, including, of course, the officers' 
baggage, was left behind. 

About noon the Rough Riders struck camp 
and drew up in column beside the road in the 
rear of the First Cavalry. Then we sat down and 
waited for hours before the order came to march, 
while regiment after regiment passed by, varied 
by bands of tatterdemalion Cuban insurgents, 
and by mule-trains with ammunition. Every 
man carried three days' provisions. We had suc- 
ceeded in borrowing mules sufficient to carry 
along the dynamite gun and the automatic Colts. 
At last, toward mid-afternoon, the First and 
113 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

Tenth Cavalry, ahead of us, marched, and we 
followed. The First was under the command of 
Lieutenant-Colonel Veile, the Tenth under Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Baldwin. Every few minutes 
there would be a stoppage in front, and at the 
halt I would make the men sit or lie down be- 
side the track, loosening their packs. The heat 
was intense as we passed through the still, close 
jungle, which formed a wall on either hand. 
Occasionally we came to gaps or open spaces, 
where some regiment was camped, and now and 
then one of these regiments, which apparently 
had been left out of its proper place, would file 
into the road, breaking up our line of march. As 
a result, we finally found ourselves following 
merely the tail of the regiment ahead of us, an 
infantry regiment being thrust into the interval. 
Once or twice we had to wade streams. Dark- 
ness came on, but we still continued to march. 
It was about eight o'clock when we turned to the 
left and climbed El Poso hill, on whose summit 
there was a ruined ranch and sugar factory, now, 
of course, deserted. Here I found General 
Wood, who was arranging for the camping of 
the brigade. Our own arrangements for the 
night were simple. I extended each troop across 
the road into the jungle, and then the men threw 
down their belongings where they stood and slept 

114 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

on their arms. Fortunately, there was no rain. 
Wood and I curled up under our rain-coats on 
the saddle-blankets, while his two aides, Captain 
A. L. Mills and Lieutenant W. N. Ship, slept 
near us. We were up before dawn and getting 
breakfast. Mills and Ship had nothing to eat, 
and they breakfasted with Wood and myself, as 
we had been able to get some handfuls of beans, 
and some coffee and sugar, as well as the ordinary 
bacon and hardtack. 

We did not talk much, for though we were in 
ignorance as to precisely what the day would 
bring forth, we knew that we should see fight- 
ing. We had slept soundly enough, although, of 
course, both Wood and I during the night had 
made a round of the sentries, he of the brigade, 
and I of the regiment; and I suppose that, ex- 
cepting among hardened veterans, there is always 
a certain feeling of uneasy excitement the night 
before the battle. 

Mills and Ship were both tall, fine-looking 
men, of tried courage, and thoroughly trained in 
every detail of their profession ; I remember being 
struck by the quiet, soldierly way they were 
going about their work early that morning. 
Before noon one was killed and the other danger- 
ously wounded. 

General Wheeler was sick, but with his usual 

"5 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

indomitable pluck and entire indifference to his 
own personal comfort, he kept to the front. He 
was unable to retain command of the cavalry- 
division, which accordingly devolved upon Gen- 
eral Samuel Sumner, who commanded it until 
mid-afternoon, when the bulk of the fighting was 
over. General Sumner's own brigade fell to 
Colonel Henry Carroll. General Sumner led the 
advance with the cavalry, and the battle was 
fought by him and by General Kent, who com- 
manded the infantry division, and whose foremost 
brigade was led by General Hawkins. 

As the sun rose the men fell in, and at the 
same time a battery of field-guns was brought 
up on the hill-crest just beyond, between us 
and toward Santiago. It was a fine sight to see 
the great horses straining under the lash as 
they whirled the guns up the hill and into po- 
sition. 

Our brigade was drawn up on the hither side 
of a kind of half basin, a big band of Cubans 
being off to the left. As yet we had received no 
orders, except that we were told that the main 
fighting was to be done by Lawton's infantry 
division, which was to take El Caney, several 
miles to our right, while we were simply to make 
a diversion. This diversion was to be made 
mainly with the artillery, and the battery which 

ii6 




General Sumner, win; Conmianded the Cavalry 
Division Durini; the San Juan Fig^ht. 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

had taken position immediately in front of us 
was to begin when Lawton began. 

It was about six o'clock that the first report of 
the cannon from El Caney came booming to us 
across the miles of still jungle. It was a very 
lovely morning, the sky of cloudless blue, while 
the level, shimmering rays from the just-risen sun 
brought into fine relief the splendid palms which 
here and there towered above the lower growth. 
The lofty and beautiful mountains hemmed in 
the Santiago plain, making it an amphitheatre for 
the battle. 

Immediately our guns opened, and at the 
report great clouds of white smoke hung on the 
ridge crest. For a minute or two there was no 
response. Wood and I were sitting together, and 
Wood remarked to me that he wished our bri- 
gade could be moved somewhere else, for we 
were directly in line of any return fire aimed by 
the Spaniards at the battery. Hardly had he 
spoken when there was a peculiar whistling, sing- 
ing sound in the air, and immediately afterward the 
noise of something exploding over our heads. It 
was shrapnel from the Spanish batteries. We 
sprung to our feet and leaped on our horses. Im- 
mediately afterward a second shot came which burst 
directly above us; and then a third. From the 
second shell one of the shrapnel bullets dropped 

117 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

on my wrist, hardly breaking the skin, but raising 
a bump about as big as a hickory-nut. The same 
shell wounded four of my regiment, one of them 
being Mason Mitchell, and two or three of the 
regulars were also hit, one losing his leg by a 
great fragment of shell. Another shell exploded 
right in the middle of the Cubans, killing and 
wounding a good many, while the remainder scat- 
tered like guinea-hens. Wood's led horse was 
also shot through the lungs. I at once hustled 
my regiment over the crest of the hill into the 
thick underbrush, where I had no little difficulty 
in getting them together again into column. 

Meanwhile the firing continued for fifteen or 
twenty minutes, until it gradually died away. As 
the Spaniards used smokeless powder, their artil- 
lery had an enormous advantage over ours, and, 
moreover, we did not have the best type of mod- 
ern guns, our fire being slow. 

As soon as the firing ceased, Wood formed his 
brigade, with my regiment in front, and gave me 
orders to follow behind the First Brigade, which 
was just moving off the ground. In column of 
fours we marched down the trail toward the ford 
of the San Juan River. We passed two or three 
regiments of infmtry, and were several times 
halted before we came to the ford. The First 
Brigade, which was under Colonel Carroll — Lieu- 

Ii8 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

tenant-Colonel Hamilton commanding the Ninth 
Regiment, Major Wessels the Third, and Captain 
Kerr the Sixth — had already crossed and was 
marching to the right, parallel to, but a little dis- 
tance from, the river. The Spaniards in the 
trenches and block-houses on top of the hills in 
front were already firing at the brigade in desul- 
tory fashion. The extreme advance of the Ninth 
Cavalry was under Lieutenants McNamee and 
Hartwick. They were joined by General Haw- 
kins, with his staff, who was looking over the 
ground and deciding on the route he should take 
his infantry brigade. 

Our orders had been of the vaguest kind, being 
simply to march to the right and connect with 
Lawton — with whom, of course, there was no 
chance of our connecting. No reconnoissance had 
been made, and the exact position and strength 
of the Spaniards was not known. A captive bal- 
loon was up in the air at this moment, but it was 
worse than useless. A previous proper reconnois- 
sance and proper look-out from the hills would 
have given us exact information. As it was. Gen- 
erals Kent, Sumner, and Hawkins had to be their 
own reconnoissance, and they fought their troops 
so well that we won anyhow. 

I was now ordered to cross the ford, march half 
a mile or so to the right, and then halt and await 

119 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

further orders ; and I promptly hurried my men 
across, for the fire was getting hot, and the captive 
balloon, to the horror of everybody, was coming 
down to the ford. Of course, it was a special tar- 
get for the enemy's fire. I got my men across 
before it reached the ford. There it partly col- 
lapsed and remained, causing severe loss of life, 
as it indicated the exact position where the Tenth 
and the First Cavalry, and the infantry, were 
crossing. 

As I led my column slowly along, under the 
intense heat, through the high grass of the open 
jungle, the First Brigade was to our left, and the 
firing between it and the Spaniards on the hills 
grew steadily hotter and hotter. After awhile I 
came to a sunken lane, and as by this time the 
First Brigade had stopped and was engaged in a 
stand-up fight, I halted my men and sent back 
word for orders. As we faced toward the Spanish 
hills my regiment was on the right with next to 
it and a little in advance the First Cavalry, and 
behind them the Tenth. In our front the Ninth 
held the right, the Sixth the centre, and the Third 
the left ; but in the jungle the lines were already 
overlapping in places. Kent's infantry were com- 
ing up, farther to the left. 

Captain Mills was with me. The sunken lane, 
which had a wire fence on either side, led straight 

120 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

up toward, and between, the two hills in our front, 
the hill on the left, which contained heavy block- 
houses, being farther away from us than the hill 
on our right, which we afterward grew to call 
Kettle Hill, and which was surmounted merely 
by some large ranch buildings or haciendas, with 
sunken brick-lined walls and cellars. I got the 
men as well-sheltered as I could. Many of them 
lay close under the bank of the lane, others slipped 
into the San Juan River and crouched under its 
hither bank, while the rest lay down behind the 
patches of bushy jungle in the tall grass. The 
heat was intense, and many of the men were al- 
ready showing signs of exhaustion. The sides of 
the hills in front were bare ; but the country up 
to them was, for the most part, covered with such 
dense jungle that in charging through it no ac- 
curacy of formation could possibly be preserved. 

The fight was now on in good earnest, and the 
Spaniards on the hills were engaged in heavy vol- 
ley firing. The Mauser bullets drove in sheets 
through the trees and the tall jungle grass, making 
a peculiar whirring or rustling sound; some of 
the bullets seemed to pop in the air, so that we 
thought they were explosive ; and, indeed, many 
of those which were coated with brass did explode, 
in the sense that the brass coat was ripped off, 
making a thin plate of hard metal with a jagged 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

edge, which inflicted a ghastly wound. These 
bullets were shot from a 45-calibre rifle carrying 
smokeless powder, which was much used by the 
guerillas and irregular Spanish troops. The Mau- 
ser bullets themselves made a small clean hole, 
with the result that the wound healed in a mos-t 
astonishing manner. One or two of our men who 
were shot in the head had the skull blown open, 
but elsewhere the wounds from the minute steel- 
coated bullet, with its very high velocity, were cer- 
tainly nothing like as serious as those made by the 
old large-calibre, low-power rifle. If a man was shot 
through the heart, spine, or brain he was, of course, 
killed instantly; but very few of the wounded died 
— even under the appalling conditions which pre- 
vailed, owing to the lack of attendance and sup- 
plies in the field-hospitals with the army. 

While we were lying in reserve we were suf- 
fering nearly as much as afterward when we 
charged. I think that the bulk of the Spanish 
fire was practically unaimed, or at least not aimed 
at any particular man, and only occasionally at a 
particular body of men ; but they swept the whole 
field of battle up to the edge of the river, and 
man after man in our ranks fell dead or wounded, 
although I had the troopers scattered out far apart, 
taking advantage of every scrap of cover. 

Devereux was dangerously shot while he lay 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

with his men on the edge of the river. A young 
West Point cadet, Ernest Haskell, who had taken 
his hoUday with us as an acting second heutenant, 
was shot through the stomach. He had shown 
great coolness and gallantry, which he displayed 
to an even more marked degree after being 
wounded, shaking my hand and saying, "All 
right, Colonel, I'm going to get well. Don't 
bother about me, and don't let any man come 
away with me." When I shook hands with him, 
I thought he would surely die; yet he recov- 
ered. 

The most serious loss that I and the regiment 
could have suffered befell just before we charged. 
Bucky O'Neill was strolling up and down in front 
of his men, smoking his cigarette, for he was in- 
veterately addicted to the habit. He had a theory 
that an officer ought never to take cover — a theory 
which was, of course, wrong, though in a volun- 
teer organization the officers should certainly ex- 
pose themselves very fully, simply for the effect 
on the men; our regimental toast on the trans- 
port running, "The officers; may the war last 
until each is killed, wounded, or promoted." As 
O'Neill moved to and fro, his men begged him 
to lie down, and one of the sergeants said, " Cap- 
tain, a bullet is sure to hit you." O'Neill took 
his cigarette out of his moudi, and blowing out a 

123 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

cloud of smoke laughed and said, " Sergeant, the 
Spanish bullet isn't made that will kill me." A 
little later he discussed for a moment with one of 
the regular officers the direction from which the 
Spanish fire was coming. As he turned on his 
heel a bullet struck him in the mouth and came 
out at the back of his head; so that even before 
he fell his wild and gallant soul had gone out 
into the darkness. 

My orderly was a brave young Harvard boy, 
Sanders, from the quaint old Massachusetts town 
of Salem. The work of an orderly on foot, under 
the blazing sun, through the hot and matted jun- 
gle, was very severe, and finally the heat overcame 
him. He dropped ; nor did he ever recover fully, 
and later he died from fever. In his place I sum- 
moned a trooper whose name I did not know. 
Shortly afterward, while sitting beside the bank, 
I directed him to go back and ask whatever gen- 
eral he came across if I could not advance, as my 
men were being much cut up. He stood up to 
salute and then pitched forward across my knees, 
a bullet having gone through his throat, cutting 
the carotid. 

When O'Neill was shot, his troop, who were 
devoted to him, were for the moment at a loss 
whom to follow. One of their number, Henry 
Bardshar, a huge Arizona miner, immediately at- 

124 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

tached himself to me as my orderly, and from that 
moment he was closer to me, not only in the fight, 
but throughout the rest of the campaign, than any 
other man, not even excepting the color-sergeant, 
Wright. 

Captain Mills was with me ; gallant Ship had 
already been killed. Mills was an invaluable aide, 
absolutely cool, absolutely unmoved or flurried in 
any way. 

I sent messenger after messenger to try to find 
General Sumner or General Wood and get per- 
mission to advance, and was just about making 
up my mind that in the absence of orders I had 
better " march toward the guns," when Lieutenant- 
Colonel Dorst came riding up through the storm 
of bullets with the welcome command " to move 
forward and support the regulars in the assault on 
the hills in front." General Sumner had obtained 
authority to advance from Lieutenant Miley, who 
was representing General Shafter at the front, and 
was in the thick of the fire. The General at once 
ordered the first brigade to advance on the hills, 
and the second to support it. He himself was 
riding his horse along the lines, superintending 
the fight. Later I overheard a couple of my men 
talking together about him. What they said il- 
lustrates the value of a display of courage among 
the officers in hardening their soldiers; for their 

1-5 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

theme was how, as they were lying down under a 
fire which they could not return, and were in con- 
sequence feeling rather nervous, General Sumner 
suddenly appeared on horseback, sauntering by 
quite unmoved ; and, said one of the men, " That 
made us feel all right. If the General could stand 
it, we could." 

The instant I received the order I sprang on 
my horse and then my " crowded hour " began. 
The guerillas had been shooting at us from the 
edges of the jungle and from their perches in the 
leafy trees, and as they used smokeless powder, it 
was almost impossible to see them, though a few 
of my men had from time to time responded. 
We had also suffered from the hill on our right 
front, which was held chiefly by guerillas, although 
there were also some Spanish regulars with them, 
for we found their dead. I formed my men in 
column of troops, each troop extended in open 
skirmishing order, the right resting on the wire 
fences which bordered the sunken lane. Captain 
Jenkins led the first squadron, his eyes literally 
dancing with joyous excitement. 

I started in the rear of the regiment, the posi- 
tion in which the colonel should theoretically stay. 
Captain Mills and Captain McCormick were both 
with me as aides ; but I speedily had to send them 
off on special duty in getting the different bodies 

126 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

of men forward. I had intended to go into action 
on foot as at Las Guasimas, but the heat was so 
oppressive that I found I should be quite unable 
to run up and down the line and superintend 
matters unless I was mounted; and, moreover, 
when on horseback, I could see the men better 
and they could see me better. 

A curious incident happened as I was getting 
the men started forward. Always when men have 
been lying down under cover for some time, and 
are required to advance, there is a little hesitation, 
each looking to see whether the others are going 
forward. As I rode down the line, calling to the 
troopers to go forward, and rasping brief directions 
to the captains and lieutenants, I came upon a 
man lying behind a little bush, and I ordered him 
to jump up. I do not think he understood that 
we were making a forward move, and he looked 
up at me for a moment with hesitation, and I again 
bade him rise, jeering him and saying: "Are you 
afraid to stand up when I am on horseback ? " As 
I spoke, he suddenly fell forward on his face, a bul- 
let having struck him and gone through him length- 
wise. I suppose the bullet had been aimed at me ; 
at any rate, I, who was on horseback in the open, 
was unhurt, and the man lying flat on the ground 
in the cover beside me was killed. There were 
several pairs of brothers with us ; of the two Nor- 

127 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

tons one was killed ; of the two McCurdys one 
was wounded. 

I soon found that I could get that line, behind 
which I personally was, faster forward than the 
one immediately in front of it, with the result that 
the two rearmost lines of the regiment began to 
crowd together; so I rode through them both, the 
better to move on the one in front. This hap- 
pened with every line in succession, until I found 
myself at the head of the regiment. 

Both lieutenants of B Troop from Arizona had 
been exerting themselves greatly, and both were 
overcome by the heat; but Sergeants Campbell 
and Davidson took it forward in splendid shape. 
Some of the men from this troop and from the 
other Arizona troop (Bucky O'Neill's) joined me 
as a kind of fighting tail. 

The Ninth Regiment was immediately in front 
of me, and the First on my left, and these went 
up Kettle Hill with my regiment. The Third, 
Sixth, and Tenth went partly up Kettle Hill (fol- 
lowing the Rough Riders and the Ninth and First), 
and partly between that and the block-house hill, 
which the infantry were assailing. General Sum- 
ner in person gave the Tenth the order to charge 
the hills; and it went forward at a rapid gait. 
The three regiments went forward more or less 
intermingled, advancing steadily and keeping up 

128 




u 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

a heavy fire. Up Kettle Hill Sergeant George 
Berry, of the Tenth, bore not only his own regi- 
mental colors but those of the Third, the color- 
sergeant of the Third having been shot down ; he 
kept shouting, " Dress on the colors, boys, dress 
on the colors I " as he followed Captain Ayres, 
who was running in advance of his men, shouting 
and waving his hat. The Tenth Cavalry lost a 
greater proportion of its officers than any other 
regiment in the battle — eleven out of twenty-two. 

By the time I had come to the head of the 
regiment we ran into the left wing of the Ninth 
Regulars, and some of the First Regulars, who 
were lying down ; that is, the troopers were lying 
down, while the officers were walking to and fro. 
The officers of the white and colored regiments 
alike took the greatest pride in seeing that the 
men more than did their duty; and the mortality 
among them was great. 

I spoke to the captain in command of the rear 
platoons, saying that I had been ordered to support 
the regulars in the attack upon the hills, and that 
in my judgment we could not take these hills by 
firing at them, and that we must rush them. He 
answered that his orders were to keep his men 
lying where they were, and that he could not 
charge without orders. I asked where the Colonel 
was, and as he was not in sight, said, " Then I am 

129 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the ranking officer here and I give the order 
to charge " — for I did not want to keep the men 
longer in the open suffering under a fire which 
they could not effectively return. Naturally the 
Captain hesitated to obey this order when no word 
had been received from his own Colonel. So I 
said, " Then let my men through, sir," and rode 
on through the lines, followed by the grinning 
Rough Riders, whose attention had been com- 
pletely taken off the Spanish bullets, partly by my 
dialogue with the regulars, and partly by the lan- 
guage I had been using to themselves as I got the 
lines forward, for I had been joking with some 
and swearing at others, as the exigencies of the 
case seemed to demand. When we started to go 
through, however, it proved too much for the 
regulars, and they jumped up and came along, 
their officers and troops mingling with mine, all 
being delighted at the chance. When I got to 
where the head of the left wing of the Ninth was 
lying, through the courtesy of Lieutenant Hart- 
wick, two of whose colored troopers threw down 
the fence, I was enabled to get back into the lane, 
at the same time waving my hat, and giving the 
order to charge the hill on our right front. Out 
of my sight, over on the right, Captains McBlain 
and Taylor, of the Ninth, made up their minds 
independently to charge at just about this time ; 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

and at almost the same moment Colonels Carroll 
and Hamilton, who were off, I believe, to my left, 
where we could see neither them nor their men, 
gave the order to advance. But of all this I knew 
nothing at the time. The whole line, tired of 
waiting, and eager to close with the enemy, was 
straining to go forward ; and it seems that differ- 
ent parts slipped the leash at almost the same mo- 
ment. The First Cavalry came up the hill just 
behind, and partly mixed with my regiment and 
the Ninth. As already said, portions of the Third, 
Sixth, and Tenth followed, while the rest of the 
members of these three regiments kept more in 
touch with the infantry on our left. 

By this time we were all in the spirit of the 
thing and greatly excited by the charge, the men 
cheering and running forward between shots, while 
the delighted faces of the foremost officers, like 
Captain C. J. Stevens, of the Ninth, as they ran 
at the head of their troops, will always stay in my 
mind. As soon as I was in the line I galloped 
forward a few yards until I saw that the men were 
well started, and then galloped back to help 
Goodrich, who was in command of his troop, 
get his men across the road so as to attack the 
hill from that side. Captain Mills had already 
thrown three of the other troops of the regiment 
across this road for the same purpose. Wheeling 

131 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

around, I then again galloped toward the hill, 
passing the shouting, cheering, firing men, and 
went up the lane, splashing through a small stream ; 
when I got abreast of the ranch buildings on the 
top of Kettle Hill, I turned and went up the slope. 
Being on horseback I was, of course, able to get 
ahead of the men on foot, excepting my orderly, 
Henry Bardshar, who had run ahead very fast in 
order to get better shots at the Spaniards, who 
were now running out of the ranch buildings. 
Sergeant Campbell and a number of the Arizona 
men, and Dudley Dean, among others, were very 
close behind. Stevens, with his platoon of the 
Ninth, was abreast of us ; so were McNamee and 
Hartwick. Some forty yards from the top I ran 
into a wire fence and jumped off Little Texas, 
turning him loose. He had been scraped by a 
couple of bullets, one of which nicked my elbow, 
and I never expected to see him again. As I ran 
up to the hill, Bardshar stopped to shoot, and two 
Spaniards fell as he emptied his magazine. These 
were the only Spaniards I actually saw fall to 
aimed shots by any one of my men, with the ex- 
ception of two guerillas in trees. 

Almost immediately afterward the hill was cov- 
ered by the troops, both Rough Riders and the 
colored troopers of the Ninth, and some men of 
the First. There was the usual confusion, and 

132 




u 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

afterward there was much discussion as to exactly 
who had been on the hill first. The first guidons 
planted there were those of the three New Mexi- 
can troops, G, E, and F, of my regiment, under 
their Captains, Llewellen, Luna, and Muller, but 
on the extreme right of the hill, at the opposite 
end from where we struck it, Captains Taylor and 
McBlain and their men of the Ninth were first up. 
Each of the five captains was firm in the belief 
that his troop was first up. As for the individual 
men, each of whom honestly thought he was first 
on the summit, their name was legion. One 
Spaniard was captured in the buildings, another 
was shot as he tried to hide himself, and a few 
others were killed as they ran. 

Among the many deeds of conspicuous gallan- 
try here performed, two, both to the credit of the 
First Cavalry, may be mentioned as examples of 
the others, not as exceptions. Sergeant Charles 
Karsten, while close beside Captain Tutherly, the 
squadron commander, was hit by a shrapnel bullet. 
He continued on the line, firing until his arm grew 
numb ; and he then refused to go to the rear, and 
devoted himself to taking care of the wounded, 
utterly unmoved by the heavy fire. Trooper 
Hugo Brittain, when wounded, brought the regi- 
mental standard forward, waving it to and fro, to 
cheer the men. 

133 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

No sooner were we on the crest than the Span- 
iards from the line of hills in our front, where they 
were strongly intrenched, opened a very heavy 
fire upon us with their rifles. They also opened 
upon us with one or two pieces of artillery, using 
time fuses which burned very accurately, the shells 
exploding right over our heads. 

On the top of the hill was a huge iron kettle, 
or something of the kind, probably used for sugar 
refining. Several of our men took shelter behind 
this. We had a splendid view of the charge on 
the San Juan block-house to our left, where the 
infantry of Kent, led by Hawkins, were climbing 
the hill. Obviously the proper thing to do was 
to help them, and I got the men together and 
started them volley-firing against the Spaniards 
in the San Juan block-house and in the trenches 
around it. We could only see their heads; of 
course this was all we ever could see when we 
were firing at them in their trenches. Stevens was 
directing not only his own colored troopers, but a 
number of Rough Riders ; for in a melee good 
soldiers are always prompt to recognize a good 
officer, and are eager to follow him. 

We kept up a brisk fire for some five or ten 
minutes; meanwhile we were much cut up our- 
selves. Gallant Colonel Hamilton, than whom 
there was never a braver man, was killed, and 

134 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

equally gallant Colonel Carroll wounded. When 
near the summit Captain Mills had been shot 
through the head, the bullet destroying the sight 
of one eye permanently and of the other tempo- 
rarily. He would not go back or let any man 
assist him, sitting down where he was and wait- 
ing until one of the men brought him word that 
the hill was stormed. Colonel Veile planted the 
standard of the First Cavalry on the hill, and 
General Sumner rode up. He was fighting his 
division in great form, and was always himself in 
the thick of the fire. As the men were much ex- 
cited by the firing, they seemed to pay very little 
heed to their own losses. 

Suddenly, above the cracking of the carbines, 
rose a peculiar drumming sound, and some of the 
men cried, " The Spanish machine-guns ! " Lis- 
tening, I made out that it came from the flat 
ground to the left, and jumped to my feet, smit- 
ing my hand on my thigh, and shouting aloud 
with exultation, " It's the Gatlings, men, our Gat- 
lings ! " Lieutenant Parker was bringing his four 
gatlings into action, and shoving them nearer and 
nearer the front. Now and then the drumming 
ceased for a moment; then it would resound 
again, always closer to San Juan hill, which 
Parker, like ourselves, was hammering to assist 
the infantry attack. Our men cheered lustily. 

135 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

We saw much of Parker after that, and there was 
never a more welcome sound than his Gathngs as 
they opened. It was the only sound which I ever 
heard my men cheer in battle. 

The infantry got nearer and nearer the crest of 
the hill. At last we could see the Spaniards run- 
ning from the rifle-pits as the Americans came on 
in their final rush. Then I stopped my men for 
fear they should injure their comrades, and called 
to them to charge the next line of trenches, on 
the hills in our front, from which we had been 
undergoing a good deal of punishment. Think- 
ing that the men would all come, I jumped over 
the wire fence in front of us and started at the 
double ; but, as a matter of fact, the troopers were 
so excited, what with shooting and being shot, and 
shouting and cheering, that they did not hear, or did 
not heed me ; and after running about a hundred 
yards I found I had only five men along with me. 
Bullets were ripping the grass all around us, and 
one of the men, Clay Green, was mortally wound- 
ed ; another, Winslow Clark, a Harvard man, was 
shot first in the leg and then through the body. 
He made not the slightest murmur, only asking 
me to put his water canteen where he could get at 
it, which I did ; he ultimately recovered. There 
was no use going on with the remaining three 
men, and I bade them stay where they were while 

136 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

I went back and brought up the rest of the bri- 
gade. This was a decidedly cool request, for 
there was really no possible point in letting them 
stay there while I went back ; but at the moment 
it seemed perfectly natural to me, and apparently so 
to them, for they cheerfully nodded, and sat down 
in the grass, firing back at the line of trenches 
from which the Spaniards were shooting at them. 
Meanwhile, I ran back, jumped over the wire 
fence, and went over the crest of the hill, filled 
with anger against the troopers, and especially 
those of my own regiment, for not having accom- 
panied me. They, of course, were quite innocent 
of wrong-doing ; and even while I taunted them 
bitterly for not having followed me, it was all I 
could do not to smile at the look of injury and 
surprise that came over their faces, while they 
cried out, " We didn't hear you, we didn't see 
you go, Colonel ; lead on now, we'll sure follow 
you." I wanted the other regiments to come too, 
so I ran down to where General Sumner was and 
asked him if I might make the charge ; and he 
told me to go and that he would see that the men 
followed. By this time everybody had his atten- 
tion attracted, and when I leaped over the fence 
again, with Major Jenkins beside me, the men of 
the various regiments which were already on the 
hill came with a rush, and we started across the 

137 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

wide valley which lay between us and the Spanish 
intrenchments. Captain Dimmick, now in com- 
mand of the Ninth, was bringing it forward; 
Captain McBlain had a number of Rough Riders 
mixed in with his troop, and led them all together; 
Captain Taylor had been severely wounded. The 
long-legged men like Greenway, Goodrich, sharp- 
shooter Proffit, and others, outstripped the rest of 
us, as we had a considerable distance to go. Long 
before we got near them the Spaniards ran, save 
a few here and there, who either surrendered or 
were shot down. When we reached the trenches 
we found them filled with dead bodies in the light 
blue and white uniform of the Spanish regular 
army. There were very few wounded. Most of 
the fallen had little holes in their heads from which 
their brains were oozing ; for they were covered 
from the neck down by the trenches. 

It was at this place that Major Wessels, of the 
Third Cavalry, was shot in the back of the head. 
It was a severe wound, but after having it bound 
up he again came to the front in command of his 
regiment. Among the men who were foremost 
was Lieutenant Milton F. Davis, of tlie First 
Cavalry. He had been joined by three men of 
the Seventy-first New York, who ran up, and, 
saluting, said, " Lieutenant, we want to go with 
you, our officers won't lead us." One of the brave 

138 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

fellows was soon afterward shot in the face. Lieu- 
tenant Davis's first sergeant, Clarence Gould, killed 
a Spanish soldier with his revolver, just as the Span- 
iard was aiming at one of my Rough Riders. At 
about the same time I also shot one. I was with 
Henry Bardshar, running up at the double, and 
two Spaniards leaped from the trenches and fired 
at us, not ten yards away. As they turned to run 
I closed in and fired twice, missing the first and 
killing the second. My revolver was from the 
sunken battle-ship Maine, and had been given me 
by my brother-in-law. Captain W. S. Cowles, of 
the Navy. At the time I did not know of Gould's 
exploit, and supposed my feat to be unique ; and 
although Gould had killed his Spaniard in the 
trenches, not very far from me, I never learned of 
it until weeks after. It is astonishing what a lim- 
ited area of vision and experience one has in the 
hurly-burly of a battle. 

There was very great confusion at this time, 
the different regiments being completely inter- 
mingled — white regulars, colored regulars, and 
Rough Riders. General Sumner had kept a con- 
siderable force in reserve on Kettle Hill, under 
Major Jackson, of the Third Cavalry. We were 
still under a heavy fire and I got together a mixed 
lot of men and pushed on from the trenches and 
ranch-houses which we had just taken, driving the 

139 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

Spaniards through a line of palm-trees, and over 
the crest of a chain of hills. When we reached 
these crests we found ourselves overlooking San- 
tiago. Some of the men, including Jenkins, 
Greenway, and Goodrich, pushed on almost by 
themselves far ahead. Lieutenant Hugh Berkely, 
of the First, with a sergeant and two troopers, 
reached the extreme front. He was, at the time, 
ahead of everyone ; the sergeant was killed and 
one trooper wounded ; but the lieutenant and the 
remaining trooper stuck to their post for the rest 
of the afternoon until our line was gradually ex- 
tended to include them. 

While I was re-forming the troops on the chain 
of hills, one of General Sumner's aides, Captain 
Robert Howze — as dashing and gallant an officer 
as there was in the whole gallant cavalry division, 
by the way — came up with orders to me to halt 
where I was, not advancing farther, but to hold 
the hill at all hazards. Howze had his horse, and 
I had some difficulty in making him take proper 
shelter; he stayed with us for quite a time, un- 
able to make up his mind to leave the extreme 
front, and meanwhile jumping at the chance to 
render any service, of risk or otherwise, which the 
moment developed. 

I now had under me all the fragments of the 
six cavalry regiments which were at the extreme 

140 




'^idiS 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

front, being the highest officer left there, and I 
was in immediate command of them for the re- 
mainder of the afternoon and that night. The 
Ninth was over to the right, and the Thirteenth 
Infantry afterward came up beside it. The rest 
of Kent's infantry was to our left. Of the Tenth, 
Lieutenants Anderson, Muller, and Fleming re- 
ported to me ; Anderson was slightly wounded, 
but he paid no heed to this. All three, like every 
other officer, had troopers of various regiments 
under them; such mixing was inevitable in mak- 
ing repeated charges through thick jungle ; it was 
essentially a troop commanders', indeed, almost a 
squad leaders', fight. The Spaniards who had 
been holding the trenches and the line of hills, 
had fallen back upon their supports and we were 
under a very heavy fire both from rifles and great 
guns. At the point where we were, the grass- 
covered hill-crest was gently rounded, giving poor 
cover, and I made my men lie down on the hither 
slope. 

On the extreme left Captain Beck, of the Tenth, 
with his own troop, and small bodies of the men 
of other regiments, was exercising a practically 
independent command, driving back the Span- 
iards whenever they showed any symptoms of ad- 
vancing. He had received his orders to hold the 
line at all hazards from Lieutenant Andrews, one 

141 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

of General Sumner's aides, just as I had received 
mine from Captain Howze. Finally, he was re- 
lieved by some infantry, and then rejoined the 
rest of the Tenth, which was engaged heavily 
until dark. Major Wint being among the severely 
wounded. Lieutenant W. N. Smith was killed. 
Captain Bigelow had been wounded three times. 
Our artillery made one or two efforts to come 
into action on the firing-line of the infantry, but 
the black powder rendered each attempt fruitless. 
The Spanish guns used smokeless powder, so that 
it was difficult to place them. In this respect they 
were on a par with their own infantry and with 
our regular infantry and dismounted cavalry ; but 
our only two volunteer infantry regiments, the 
Second Massachusetts and the Seventy-first New 
York, and our artillery, all had black powder. 
This rendered the two volunteer regiments, which 
were armed with the antiquated Springfield, al- 
most useless in the battle, and did practically the 
same thing for the artillery wherever it was formed 
within rifle range. When one of the guns was 
discharged a thick cloud of smoke shot out and 
hung over the place, making an ideal target, and 
in a half minute every Spanish gun and rifle with- 
in range was directed at the particular spot thus 
indicated ; the consequence was that after a more 
or less lengthy stand the gun was silenced or 

142 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

driven off. We got no appreciable help from 
our guns on July ist. Our men were quick to 
realize the defects of our artillery, but they were 
entirely philosophic about it, not showing the 
least concern at its failure. On the contrary, 
whenever they heard our artillery open they would 
grin as they looked at one another and remark, 
"There go the guns again; wonder how soon 
they'll be shut up," and shut up they were sure to 
be. The light battery of Hotchkiss one-pounders, 
under Lieutenant J. B. Hughes, of the Tenth 
Cavalry, was handled with conspicuous gallantry. 
On the hill-slope immediately around me I had 
a mixed force composed of members of most of 
the cavalry regiments, and a few infantrymen. 
There were about fifty of my Rough Riders with 
Lieutenants Goodrich and Carr. Among the rest 
were perhaps a score of colored infantrymen, but, \ 

as it happened, at this particular point without any \ 

of their officers. No troops could have behaved 
better that the colored soldiers had behaved so 
far ; but they are, of course, peculiarly dependent 
upon their white officers. Occasionally they pro- 
duce non-commissioned officers who can take the 
initiative and accept responsibility precisely like 
the best class of whites; but this cannot be ex- 
pected normally, nor is it fair to expect it. With 
the colored troops there should always be some of 

143 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

their own officers ; whereas, with the white regu- 
lars, as with my own Rough Riders, experience 
showed that the non-commissioned officers could 
usually carry on the fight by themselves if they 
were once started, no matter whether their officers 
were killed or not. 

At this particular time it was trying for the 
men, as they were lying flat on their faces, very 
rarely responding to the bullets, shells, and shrap- 
nel which swept over the hill-top, and which oc- 
casionally killed or wounded one of their number. 
Major Albert G. Forse, of the First Cavalry, a 
noted Indian fighter, was killed about this time. 
One of my best men. Sergeant Greenly, of Ari- 
zona, who was lying beside me, suddenly said, 
" Beg pardon, Colonel ; but I've been hit in the 
leg." I asked, " Badly ? " He said, " Yes, Col- 
onel ; quite badly." After one of his comrades 
had helped him fix up his leg with a first-aid-to- 
the-injured bandage, he limped off to the rear. 

None of the white regulars or Rough Riders 
showed the slightest sign of weakening; but under 
the strain the colored infantrymen (who had none 
of their officers) began to get a little uneasy and 
to drift to the rear, either helping wounded men, 
or saying that they wished to find their own regi- 
ments. This I could not allow, as it was deplet- 
ing my line, so I jumped up, and walking a few 

144 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

yards to the rear, drew my revolver, halted the 
retreating soldiers, and called out to them that I 
appreciated the gallantry with which they had 
fought and would be sorry to hurt them, but that 
I should shoot the first man who, on any pretence 
whatever, went to the rear. My own men had all 
sat up and were watching my movements with 
the utmost interest; so was Captain Howze. I 
ended my statement to the colored soldiers by 
saying : " Now, I shall be very sorry to hurt you, 
and you don't know whether or not I will keep 
my word, but my men can tell you that I always 
do ; " whereupon my cow-punchers, hunters, and 
miners solemnly nodded their heads and com- 
mented in chorus, exactly as if in a comic opera, 
" He always does ; he always does I " 

This was the end of the trouble, for the " smoked 
Yankees " — as the Spaniards called the colored sol- 
diers — flashed their white teeth at one another, as 
they broke into broad grins, and I had no more 
trouble with them, they seeming to accept me as 
one of their own officers. The colored cavalry- 
men had already so accepted me ; in return, the 
Rough Riders, although for the most part South- 
westerners, who have a strong color prejudice, 
grew to accept them with hearty good-will as 
comrades, and were entirely willing, in their own 
phrase, "to drink out of the same canteen." 

145 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

Where all the regular officers did so well, it is 
hard to draw any distinction ; but in the cavalry 
division a peculiar meed of praise should be given 
to the officers of the Ninth and Tenth for their 
work, and under their leadership the colored troops 
did as well as any soldiers could possibly do. 

In the course of the afternoon the Spaniards in 
our front made the only offensive movement which 
I saw them make during the entire campaign; 
for what were ordinarily called "attacks" upon 
our lines consisted merely of heavy firing from 
their trenches and from their skirmishers. In this 
case they did actually begin to make a forward 
movement, their cavalry coming up as well as the 
marines and reserve infantry,* while their skir- 
mishers, who were always bold, redoubled their 
activity. It could not be called a charge, and not 
only was it not pushed home, but it was stopped 
almost as soon as it began, our men immediately 
running forward to the crest of the hill with shouts 
of delight at seeing their enemies at last came into 
the open. A few seconds' firing stopped their 
advance and drove them into the cover of the 
trenches. 

They kept up a very heavy fire for some time 
longer, and our men again lay down, only replying 

* Lieutenant Tejeiro, p. 154, speaks of this attempt to retake San 
Juan and its failure. 

146 




rt >- 
Q = 



^ :^ 




P is 

O = 




O ^ 




THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

occasionally. Suddenly we heard on our right 
the peculiar drumming sound which had been so 
welcome in the morning, when the inflmtry were 
assailing the San Juan block-house. The Gatlings 
were up again I I started over to inquire, and 
Ibund that Lieutenant Parker, not content with 
using his guns in support of the attacking forces, 
had thrust them forward to the extreme front of 
the fighting line, where he was handling them 
with great effect. From this time on, throughout 
the fighting, Parker's Gatlings were on the right 
of my regiment, and his men and mine fraternized 
in every way. He kept his pieces at the extreme 
front, using them on every occasion until the last 
Spanish shot was fired. Indeed, the dash and ef- 
ficiency with which the Gatlings were handled by 
Parker was one of the most striking features of 
the campaign ; he showed that a first-rate officer 
could use machine-guns, on wheels, in battle and 
skirmish, in attacking and defending trenches, 
alongside of the best troops, and to their great 
advantage. 

As night came on, the firing gradually died 
away. Before this happened, however. Captains 
Morton and Boughton, of the Third Cavalry, 
came over to tell me that a rumor had reached 
them to the effect that there had been some talk 
of retiring and that they wished to protest in the 

147 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

strongest manner. I had been watching them 
both, as they handled their troops with the cool 
confidence of the veteran regular officer, and had 
been congratulating myself that they were off 
toward the right flank, for as long as they were 
there, I knew I was perfectly safe in that direc- 
tion. I had heard no rumor about retiring, and 
I cordially agreed with them that it would be far 
worse than a blunder to abandon our position. 

To attack the Spaniards by rushing across open 
ground, or through wire entanglements and low, 
almost impassable jungle, without the help of 
artillery, and to force unbroken infantry, fighting 
behind earthworks and armed with the best re- 
peating weapons, supported by cannon, was one 
thing; to repel such an attack ourselves, or to 
fight our foes on anything like even terms in the 
open, was quite another thing. No possible num- 
ber of Spaniards coming at us from in front could 
have driven us from our position, and there was 
not a man on the crest who did not eagerly and 
devoutly hope that our opponents would make 
the attempt, for it would surely have been followed, 
not merely by a repulse, but by our immediately 
taking the city. There was not an officer or a 
man on the firing-line, so far as I saw them, who 
did not feel this way. 

As night fell, some of my men went back to 
148 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

the buildings in our rear and foraged through 
them, for we had now been fourteen hours charg- 
ing and fighting without food. They came across 
what was evidently the Spanish officers' mess, 
where their dinner was still cooking, and they 
brought it to the front in high glee. It was evi- 
dent that the Spanish officers were living well, 
however the Spanish rank and file were faring. 
There were three big iron pots, one filled with 
beef-stew, one with boiled rice, and one with boiled 
peas; there was a big demijohn of rum (all along 
the trenches which the Spaniards held were empty 
wine and liquor bottles) ; there were a number of 
loaves of rice-bread ; and there were even some 
small cans of preserves and a few salt fish. Of 
course, among so many men, the food, which was 
equally divided, did not give very much to each, 
but it freshened us all. 

Soon after dark, General Wheeler, who in the 
afternoon had resumed command of the cavalry 
division, came to the front. A very few words 
with General Wheeler reassured us about retirin"-. 

o 

He had been through too much heavy fighting in 
the Civil War to regard the present fight as very 
serious, and he told us not to be under any ap- 
prehension, for he had sent word that there was 
no need whatever of retiring, and was sure we 
would stay where we were until the chance came 

149 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

to advance. He was second in command ; and 
to him more than to any other one man was due 
the prompt abandonment of the proposal to fall 
back — a proposal which, if adopted, would have 
meant shame and disaster. 

Shortly afterward General Wheeler sent us or- 
ders to intrench. The men of the different regi- 
ments were now getting in place again and sifting 
themselves out. All of our troops who had been 
kept at Kettle Hill came forward and rejoined 
us after nightfall. During the afternoon Green- 
way, apparently not having enough to do in the 
fighting, had taken advantage of a lull to explore 
the buildings himself, and had found a number of 
Spanish intrenching tools, picks, and shovels, and 
these we used in digging trenches along our line. 
The men were very tired indeed, but they went 
cheerfully to work, all the officers doing their part. 

Crockett, the ex-Revenue officer from Georgia, 
was a slight man, not physically very strong. He 
came to me and told me he didn't think he would 
be much use in digging, but that he had found a 
lot of Spanish coffee and would spend his time 
making coffee for the men, if I approved. I did 
approve very heartily, and Crockett officiated as 
cook for the next three or four hours until the 
trench was dug, his coffee being much appreci- 
ated by all of us. 

150 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

So many acts of gallantry were performed dur- 
ing the day that it is quite impossible to notice 
them all, and it seems unjust to single out any; 
yet I shall mention a few, which it must always 
be remembered are to stand, not as exceptions, 
but as instances of what very many men did. It 
happened that I saw these myself There were 
innumerable others, which either were not seen at 
all, or were seen only by officers who happened 
not to mention them ; and, of course, I know 
chiefly those that happened in my own regiment. 

Captain Llewellen was a large, heavy man, who 
had a grown-up son in the ranks. On the march 
he had frequently carried the load of some man 
who weakened, and he was not feeling well on 
the morning of the fight. Nevertheless, he kept 
at the head of his troop all day. In the charging 
and rushing, he not only became very much ex- 
hausted, but finally fell, wrenching himself terribly, 
and though he remained with us all night, he was 
so sick by morning that we had to take him be- 
hind the hill into an improvised hospital. Lieu- 
tenant Day, after handling his troop with equal 
gallantry and efficiency, was shot, on the summit 
of Kettle Hill. He was hit in the arm and was 
forced to go to the rear, but he would not return 
to the States, and rejoined us at the front long 
before his wound was healed. Lieutenant Leahy 

151 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

was also wounded, not far from him. Thirteen 
of the men were wounded and yet kept on fight- 
ing until the end of the day, and in some cases 
never went to the rear at all, even to have their 
wounds dressed. They were Corporals Waller 
and Fortescue and Trooper McKinley of Troop 
E ; Corporal Roades of Troop D ; Troopers Al- 
bertson, Winter, McGregor, and Ray Clark of 
Troop F ; Troopers Bugbee, Jackson, and Waller 
of Troop A ; Trumpeter McDonald of Troop L ; 
Sergeant Hughes of Troop B ; and Trooper Giev- 
ers of Troop G. One of the Wallers was a cow- 
puncher from New Mexico, the other the cham- 
pion Yale high-jumper. The first was shot through 
the left arm so as to paralyze the fingers, but he 
continued in battle, pointing his rifle over the 
wounded arm as though it had been a rest. The 
other Waller, and Bugbee, were hit in the head, 
the bullets merely inflicting scalp wounds. Neither 
of them paid any heed to the wounds except that 
after nightfall each had his head done up in a 
bandage. Fortescue I was at times using as an 
extra orderly. I noticed he limped, but supposed 
that his foot was skinned. It proved, however, 
that he had been struck in the foot, though not 
very seriously, by a bullet, and I never knew 
what was the matter until the next day I saw him 
making wry faces as he drew off his bloody boot, 

152 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

which was stuck fast to the foot. Trooper Row- 
hmd again distinguished himself by his fearless- 
ness. 

For gallantry on the field of action Sergeants 
Dame, Ferguson, Tiffany, Greenwald, and, later 
on, Mcllhenny, were promoted to second lieuten- 
ancies, as Sergeant Hayes had already been. Lieu- 
tenant Carr, wlio commanded his troop, and be- 
haved with great gallantry throughout the day, 
was shot and severely wounded at nightfall. He 
was the son of a Confederate officer; his was the 
fifth generation which, from father to son, had 
fought in every war of the United States. Among 
the men whom I noticed as leading in the charges 
and always being nearest the enemy, were the 
Pawnee, Pollock, Simpson of Texas, and Dudley 
Dean. Jenkins was made major, Woodbury Kane, 
Day, and Frantz captains, and Greenway and 
Goodrich first lieutenants, for gallantry in action, 
and for the efficiency with which the first had 
handled his squadron, and the other five their 
troops — for each of them, owing to some accident 
to his superior, found himself in command of his 
troop. 

Dr. Church had worked quite as hard as any 
man at the front in caring for the wounded ; as 
had Chaplain Brown. Lieutenant Keyes, who 
acted as adjutant, did so well that he was given 

153 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the position permanently. Lieutenant Coleman 
similarly won the position of quartermaster. 

We finished digging the trench soon after mid- 
night, and then the worn-out men laid down in 
rows on their rifles and dropped heavily to sleep. 
About one in ten of them had blankets taken from 
the Spaniards. Henry Bardshar, my orderly, had 
procured one for me. He, Goodrich, and I slept 
together. If the men without blankets had not 
been so tired that they fell asleep anyhow, they 
would have been very cold, for, of course, we were 
all drenched with sweat, and above the waist had 
on nothing but our flannel shirts, while the night 
was cool, with a heavy dew. Before anyone had 
time to wake from the cold, however, we were all 
awakened by the Spaniards, whose skirmishers 
suddenly opened fire on us. Of course, we could 
not tell whether or not this was the forerunner of 
a heavy attack, for our Cossack posts were re- 
sponding briskly. It was about three o'clock in 
the morning, at which time men's courage is said 
to be at the lowest ebb ; but the cavalry division 
was certainly free from any weakness in that di- 
rection. At the alarm everybody jumped to his 
feet and the stiff, shivering, haggard men, their 
eyes only half-opened, all clutched their rifles and 
ran forward to the trench on the crest of the hill. 

The sputtering shots died away and we went 
154 




O c 
D- - 

— c 



- < 



i5 c 

u - 



^^- 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

to sleep again. But in another hour dawn broke 
and the Spaniards opened fire in good earnest. 
There was a little tree only a few feet away, 
under which I made my head-quarters, and while 
I was lying there, with Goodrich and Keycs, a 
shrapnel burst among us, not hurting us in the 
least, but with the sweep of its bullets killing or 
wounding: five men in our rear, one of whom was 
a singularly gallant young Harvard fellow, Stan- 
ley Hollistcr. An equally gallant young fellow 
from Yale, Theodore Miller, had already been 
mortally wounded. Hollister also died. 

The Second Brigade lost more heavily than 
the First ; but neither its brigade commander nor 
any of its regimental commanders were touched, 
while the commander of the First Brigade and 
two of its three regimental commanders had been 
killed or wounded. 

In this fight our regiment had numbered 490 
men, as, in addition to the killed and wounded 
of the first fight, some had had to go to the hos- 
pital for sickness and some had been left behind 
with the baggage, or were detailed on other 
duty. Eighty-nine were killed and wounded : 
the heaviest loss suffered by any regiment in the 
cavalry division. The Spaniards made a stiff 
fight, standing firm until we charged home. They 
fought much more stubbornly than at Las Guasi- 

155 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

mas. We ought to have expected this, for they 
have always done well in holding intrenchments. 
On this day they showed themselves to be brave 
foes, worthy of honor for their gallantry. 

In the attack on the San Juan hills our forces 
numbered about 6,600.* There were about 4,500 
Spaniards against us.f Our total loss in killed 

* According to the official reports, 5, 104 officers and men of Kent's 
infantry, and 2,649 of the cavalry had been landed. My regiment is 
put down as 542 strong, instead of the real figure, 490, the difference 
being due to men who were in hospital and on guard at the sea- 
shore, etc. In other words, the total represents the total landed ; 
the details, etc., are included. General Wheeler, in his report of 
July 7th, puts these details as about fifteen per cent, of the whole of 
the force which was on the transports ; about eighty-five per cent, 
got forward and was in the fight. 

t The total Spanish force in Santiago under General Linares was 
6,000: 4,000 regulars, 1,000 volunteers, and 1,000 marines and 
sailors from the ships. (Diary of the British Consul, Frederick W. 
Ramsden, entry of July ist.) Four thousand more troops entered 
next day. Of the 6,000 troops, 600 or thereabouts were at El Caney, 
and 900 in the forts at the mouth of the harbor. Lieutenant Tejeiro 
states that there were 520 men at El Caney, 970 in the forts at the 
mouth of the harbor, and 3,000 in the lines, not counting the cavalry 
and civil guard which were in reserve. He certainly very much 
understates the Spanish force ; thus he nowhere accounts for the en- 
gineers mentioned on p. 135 ; and his figures would make the total 
number of Spanish artillerymen but 32. He excludes the cavalry, 
the civil guard, and the marines which had been stationed at the 
Plaza del Toros ; yet he later mentions that these marines were 
brought up, and their commander, Bustamente, severely wounded ; 
he states that the cavalry advanced to cover the retreat of the infan- 
try, and I myself saw the cavalry come forward, for the most part 
dismounted, when the Spaniards attempted a forward movement late 
in the afternoon, and we shot many of their horses ; while later I 

156 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

and wounded was 1,071. Of the cavalry divis- 
ion there were, all told, some 2,300 officers and 
men, of whom 375 were killed and wounded. In 
the division over a fourth of the officers were 

saw and conversed with officers and men of the civil guard who had 
been wounded at the same time — this in connection with returning 
them their wives and children, after the latter had fled from the city. 
Although the engineers are excluded, Lieutenant Tejeiro mentions that 
their colonel, as well as the colonel of the artillery, was wounded. Four 
thousand five hundred is surely an understatement of the forces which 
resisted the attack of the forces under Wheeler. Lieutenant Tejeiro 
is very careless in his figures. Thus in one place he states that the 
position of San Juan was held by two companies comprising 250 
soldiers. Later he says it was held by three companies, whose 
strength he puts at 300 — thus making them average 100 instead of 
125 men apiece. He then mentions another echelon of two com- 
panies, so situated as to cross their fire with the others. Doubtless 
the block-house and trenches at Fort San Juan proper were only held 
by three or four hundred men ; they were taken by the Sixth and 
Sixteenth Infantry under Hawkins's immediate command ; and they 
formed but one point in the line of hills, trenches, ranch-houses, and 
block-houses which the Spaniards held, and from which we drove 
them. When the city capitulated later, over 8,000 unwounded troops 
and over 16,000 rifles and carbines were surrendered ; by that time 
the marines and sailors had of course gone, and the volunteers had 
disbanded. 

In all these figures I have taken merely the statements from the 
Spanish side. I am inclined to think the actual numbers were much 
greater than those here given. Lieutenant Wiley, in his book In 
Cuba with Shafter, which is practically an official statement, states 
that nearly 11,000 Spanish troops were surrendered; and this is the 
number given by the Spaniards themselves in the remarkable letter 
the captured soldiers addressed to General Shafter, which Wiley 
quotes in full. Lieutenant Tejeiro, in his chap, xiv., explains that 
the volunteers had disbanded before the end came, and the ma- 
rines and sailors had of course gone, while nearly a thousand men 

157 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

killed or wounded, their loss being relatively half 
as great again as that of the enlisted men — which 
was as it should be. 

I think we suffered more heavily than the 
Spaniards did in killed and wounded (though we 
also captured some scores of prisoners). It would 
have been very extraordinary if the reverse was 
the case, for we did the charging ; and to carry 



had been killed or captured or had died of wounds and disease, so 
that there must have been at least 14,000 all told. Subtracting the 
reinforcements who arrived on the 2d, this would mean about 10,000 
Spaniards present on the ist; in which case Kent and Wheeler were 
opposed by at least equal numbers. 

In dealing with the Spanish losses, Lieutenant Tejeiro contradicts 
himself. He puts their total loss on this day at 593, including 94 
killed, 121 missing, and 2 prisoners— 217 in all. Yet he states that 
of the 520 men at Caney but 80 got back, the remaining 440 being 
killed, captured, or missing. When we captured the city we found 
in the hospitals over 2,000 seriously wounded and sick Spaniards ; 
on making inquiries, I found that over a third were wounded. From 
these facts I feel that it is safe to put down the total Spanish loss 
in battle as at least 1,200, of whom over a thousand were killed and 
wounded. 

Lieutenant Tejeiro, while rightly claiming credit for the courage 
shown by the Spaniards, also praises the courage and resolution of 
the Americans, saying that they fought, "con un arrojo y una deci- 
sion verdaderamente admirables." He dwells repeatedly upon the 
determination with which our troops kept charging though themselves 
unprotected by cover. As for the Spanish troops, all who fought them 
that day will most freely admit the courage they showed. At El 
Caney, where they were nearly hemmed in, they made a most des- 
perate defence ; at San Juan the way to retreat was open, and so, 
though they were seven times as numerous, they fought with less 
desperation, but still very gallantly. 



THE CAVALRY AT SANTIAGO 

earthworks on foot with dismounted cavalry, 
when these earthworks are held by unbroken in- 
fantry armed with the best modern rifles, is a 
serious task. 



159 



IN THE TRENCHES 

WHEN the shrapnel burst among us on the 
hill-side we made up our minds that we had 
better settle down to solid siege work. All of the 
men who were not in the trenches I took off to the 
right, back of the Gatling guns, where there was 
a valley, and dispersed them by troops in shel- 
tered parts. It took us an hour or two's experi- 
menting to find out exactly what spots were free 
from danger, because some of the Spanish sharp- 
shooters were in trees in our front, where we could 
not possibly place them from the trenches; and 
these were able to reach little hollows and depres- 
sions where the men were entirely safe from the 
Spanish artillery and from their trench-fire. More- 
over, in one hollow, which we thought safe, the 
Spaniards succeeded in dropping a shell, a frag- 
ment of which went through the head of one of 
my men, who, astonishing to say, lived, although 
unconscious, for two hours afterward. Finally, I 
got all eight troops settled, and the men prompt- 

l6o 



IN THE TRENCHES 

ly proceeded to make themselves as much at 
home as possible. For the next twenty-four 
hours, however, the amount of comfort was small, 
as in the way of protection and covering we only 
had what blankets, rain-coats, and hammocks we 
took from the dead Spaniards. Ammunition, 
which was, of course, the most vital need, was 
brought up in abundance; but very little food 
reached us. That afternoon we had just enough 
to allow each man for his supper two hardtacks, 
and one hardtack extra for every four men. 

During the first night we had dug trenches suf- 
ficient in length and depth to shelter our men and 
insure safety against attack, but wc had not put in 
any traverses or approaches, nor had we arranged 
the trenches at all points in the best places for of- 
fensive work ; for we were working at night 
on ground which we had but partially explored. 
Later on an engineer officer stated that he did not 
think our work had been scientific ; and I assured 
him that I did not doubt that he was right, for I 
had never before seen a trench, excepting those we 
captured from the Spaniards, or heard of a trav- 
erse, save as I vaguely remembered reading about 
them in books. For such work as we were en- 
gaged in, however, the problem of intrenchment 
was comparatively simple, and the work we did 
proved entirely adequate. No man in my regi- 

i6i 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ment was ever hit in the trenches or going in or 
out of them. 

But on the first day there was plenty of excite- 
ment connected with relieving the firing line. 
Under the intense heat, crowded down in cramped 
attitudes in the rank, newly dug, poisonous soil 
of the trenches, the men needed to be relieved 
every six hours or so. Accordingly, in the late 
morning, and again in the afternoon, I arranged 
for their release. On each occasion I waited until 
there was a lull in the firing and then started a 
sudden rush by the relieving party, who tumbled 
into the trenches every which way. The move- 
ment resulted on each occasion in a terrific out- 
burst of fire from the Spanish lines, which proved 
quite harmless ; and as it gradually died away the 
men who had been relieved got out as best they 
could. Fortunately, by the next day I was able to 
abandon this primitive, though thrilling and wholly 
novel, mihtary method of relief 

When the hardtack came up that afternoon I 
felt much sympathy for the hungry unfortunates 
in the trenches and hated to condemn them to 
six hours more without food ; but I did not know 
how to get food into them. Little McGinty, the 
bronco buster, volunteered to make the attempt, 
and I gave him permission. He simply took a 
case of hardtack in his arms and darted toward 

162 



IN THE TRENCHES 

the trenches. The distance was but short, and 
though there was an outburst of fire, he was 
actually missed. One bullet, however, passed 
through the case of hardtack just before he dis- 
appeared with it into the trench. A trooper 
named Shanafelt repeated the feat, later, with a 
pail of coffee. Another trooper, George King, 
spent a leisure hour in the rear making soup 
out of some rice and other stuff he found in a 
Spanish house ; he brought some of it to General 
Wood, Jack Greenway, and myself, and nothing 
could have tasted more delicious. 

At this time our army in the trenches num- 
bered about 11,000 men; and the Spaniards in 
Santiago about 9,000,* their reinforcements hav- 
ing just arrived. Nobody on the firing line, 
whatever was the case in the rear, felt the slight- 
est uneasiness as to the Spaniards being able to 
break out; but there were plenty who doubted 
the advisability of trying to rush the heavy earth- 
works and wire defences in our front. 
. All day long the firing continued — musketry 

* This is probably an understatement. Lieutenant Miiller, in chap. 
xxxviii. of his book, says that there were " eight or nine thousand ; " 
this is exclusive of the men from the fleet, and apparently also of 
many of the volunteers (see chap, xiv.), all of whom were present on 
July 2d. I am inclined to think that on the evening of that day there 
were more Spanish troops inside Santiago than there were American 
troops outside. 

163 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

and cannon. Our artillery gave up the attempt 
to fight on the firing line, and was withdrawn 
well to the rear out of range of the Spanish rifles ; 
so far as we could see, it accomplished very little. 
The dynamite gun was brought up to the right 
of the regimental line. It was more effective 
than the regular artillery because it was fired 
with smokeless powder, and as it was used like a 
mortar from behind the hill, it did not betray its 
presence, and those firing it suffered no loss. 
Every few shots it got out of order, and the 
Rough Rider machinists and those furnished by 
Lieutenant Parker — whom we by this time began 
to consider as an exceedingly valuable member 
of our own regiment — would spend an hour or 
two in setting it right. Sergeant Borrowe had 
charge of it and handled it well. With him was 
Sergeant Guitilias, a gallant old fellow, a veteran 
of the Civil War, whose duties were properly 
those of standard-bearer, he having charge of 
the yellow cavalry standard of the regiment ; but 
in the Cuban campaign he was given the more 
active work of helping run the dynamite gun. 
The shots from the dynamite gun made a terrific 
explosion, but they did not seem to go accurately. 
Once one of them struck a Spanish trench and 
wrecked part of it. On another occasion one 
struck a big building, from which there promptly 

164 



IN THE TRENCHES 

swarmed both Spanish cavalry and infantry, on 
whom the Colt automatic guns played with good 
effect, during the minute that elapsed before they 
could get other cover. 

These Colt automatic guns were not, on the 
whole, very successful. The gun detail was un- 
der the charge of Sergeant (afterward Lieutenant) 
Tiffany, assisted by some of our best men, like 
Stephens, Crowninshield, Bradley, Smith, and 
Herrig. The guns were mounted on tripods. 
They were too heavy for men to carry any dis- 
tance and we could not always get mules. They 
would have been more effective if mounted on 
wheels, as the Gatlings were. Moreover, they 
proved more delicate than the Gatlings, and very 
readily got out of order. A further and serious 
disadvantage was that they did not use the Krag 
ammunition, as the Gatlings did, but the Mauser 
ammunition. The Spanish cartridges which we 
captured came in quite handily for this reason. 
Parker took the same fatherly interest in these two 
Colts that he did in the dynamite gun, and finally 
I put all three and their men under his immediate 
care, so that he had a battery of seven guns. 

In fact, I think Parker deserved rather more 
credit than any other one man in the entire cam- 
paign. I do not allude especially to his courage 
and energy, great though they were, for there were 

165 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

hundreds of his fellow-officers of the cavalry and 
infantry who possessed as much of the former 
quality, and scores who possessed as much of the 
latter; but he had the rare good judgment and 
foresight to see the possibilities of the machine- 
guns, and, thanks to the aid of General Shafter, 
he was able to organize his battery. He then, by 
his own exertions, got it to the front and proved 
that it could do invaluable work on the field of 
battle, as much in attack as in defence. Parker's 
Gatlings were our inseparable companions through- 
out the siege. After our trenches were put in 
final shape, he took off the wheels of a couple and 
placed them with our own two Colts in the 
trenches. His gunners slept beside the Rough 
Riders in the bomb-proofs, and the men shared 
with one another when either side got a supply of 
beans or of coffee and sugar ; for Parker was as 
wide-awake and energetic in getting food for his 
men as we prided ourselves upon being in getting 
food for ours. Besides, he got oil, and let our 
men have plenty for their rifles. At no hour of 
the day or night was Parker anywhere but where 
we wished him to be in the event of an attack. If 
I was ordered to send a troop of Rough Riders to 
guard some road or some break in the lines, we 
usually got Parker to send a Gatling along, and 
whether the change was made by day or by night, 

1 66 



IN THE TRENCHES 

the Gatling went, over any ground and in any 
weather. He never exposed the Gathngs need- 
lessly or unless there was some object to be 
gained, but if serious fighting broke out, he always 
took a hand. Sometimes this fighting would be 
the result of an effort on our part to quell the fire 
from the Spanish trenches; sometimes the Span- 
iards took the initiative ; but at whatever hour 
of the twenty-four serious fighting began, the 
drumming of the Catlings was soon heard through 
the cracking of our own carbines. 

I have spoken thus of Parker's Gatling detach- 
ment. How can I speak highly enough of the 
regular cavalry with whom it was our good fort- 
une to serve ? I do not believe that in any army 
of the world could be found a more gallant and 
soldierly body of fighters than the officers and 
men of the First. Third, Sixth, Ninth, and Tenth 
United States Cavalry, beside whom we marched 
to blood-bought victory under the tropic skies 
of Santiago. The American regular sets the 
standard of excellence. When we wish to give 
the utmost possible praise to a volunteer organi- 
zation, we say that it is as good as the regulars. 
I was exceedingly proud of the fact that the 
regulars treated my regiment as on a complete 
equality with themselves, and were as ready to 
see it in a post of danger and responsibility as to 

167 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

see any of their own battalions. Lieutenant Col- 
onel Dorst, a man from whom praise meant a 
good deal, christened us "the Eleventh United 
States Horse," and we endeavored, I think I may- 
say successfully, to show that we deserved the 
title by our conduct, not only in fighting and in 
marching, but in guarding the trenches and in 
policing camp. In less than sixty days the regi- 
ment had been raised, organized, armed, equipped, 
drilled, mounted, dismounted, kept for a fortnight 
on transports, and put through two victorious 
aggressive fights in very difficult country, the loss 
in killed and wounded amounting to a quarter of 
those engaged. This is a record which it is not 
easy to match in the history of volunteer organi- 
zations. The loss was but small compared to 
that which befell hundreds of regiments in some 
of the great battles of the later years of the Civil 
War ; but it may be doubted whether there was 
any regiment which made such a record during 
the first months of any of our wars. 

After the battle of San Juan my men had 
really become veterans ; they and I understood 
each other perfectly, and trusted each other 
implicitly ; they knew I would share every hard- 
ship and danger with them, would do everything 
in my power to see that they were fed, and so far 
as might be, sheltered and spared ; and in return 

i68 



IN THE TRENCHES 

I knew that they would endure every kind of 
hardship and fatigue without a murmur and face 
every danger with entire fearlessness. I felt utter 
confidence in them, and would have been more 
than willing to put them to any task which any 
crack regiment of the world, at home or abroad, 
could perform. They were natural fighters, men 
of great intelligence, great courage, great hardi- 
hood, and physical prowess ; and I could draw on 
these qualities and upon their spirit of ready, 
soldierly obedience to make up for any deficien- 
cies in the technique of the trade which they had 
temporarily adopted. It must be remembered 
that they were already good individual fighters, 
skilled in the use of the horse and the rifie, so 
that there was no need of putting them through 
the kind of training in which the ordinary raw 
recruit must spend his first year or two. 

On July 2d, as the day wore on, the fight, 
though raging fitfully at intervals, gradually died 
away. The Spanish guerillas were causing us 
much trouble. They showed great courage, 
exactly as did their soldiers who were defending 
the trenches. In fact, the Spaniards throughout 
showed precisely the qualities they did early in 
the century, when, as every student will remem- 
ber, their fleets were a helpless prey to the Eng- 
lish war-ships, and their armies utterly unable to 

169 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

stand in the open against those of Napoleon's 
marshals, while on the other hand their guerillas 
performed marvellous feats, and their defence of 
intrenchments and walled towns, as at Saragossa 
and Gerona, were the wonder of the civilized 
world. 

In our front their sharp-shooters crept up before 
dawn and either lay in the thick jungle or climbed 
into some tree with dense foliage. In these places 
it proved almost impossible to place them, as they 
kept cover very carefully, and their smokeless 
powder betrayed not the slightest sign of their 
whereabouts. They caused us a great deal of an- 
noyance and some little loss, and though our own 
sharp-shooters were continually taking shots at the 
places where they supposed them to be, and though 
occasionally we would play a Gatling or a Colt 
all through the top of a suspicious tree, I but twice 
saw Spaniards brought down out of their perches 
from in front of our lines — on each occasion the 
fall of the Spaniard being hailed with loud cheers 
by our men. 

These sharp-shooters in our front did perfectly 
legitimate work, and were entitled to all credit for 
their courage and skill. It was different with the 
guerillas in our rear. Quite a number of these 
had been posted in trees at the time of the San 
Juan fight. They were using, not Mausers, but 

170 



IN THE TRENCHES 

Remingtons, which shot smokeless powder and a 
brass-coated bullet. It was one of these bullets 
which had hit Winslow Clark by my side on 
Kettle Hill ; and though for long-range fighting 
the Remingtons were, of course, nothing like as 
good as the Mausers, they were equally service- 
able for short-range bush work, as they used 
smokeless powder. When our troops advanced 
and the Spaniards in the trenches and in reserve 
behind the hill fled, the guerillas in the trees had 
no time to get away and in consequence were left 
in the rear of our lines. As we found out from 
the prisoners we took, the Spanish officers had 
been careful to instil into the minds of their sol- 
diers the belief that the Americans never granted 
quarter, and I suppose it was in consequence of 
this that the guerillas did not surrender ; for we 
found that the Spaniards were anxious enough to 
surrender as soon as they became convinced that 
we would treat them mercifully. At any rate, 
these guerillas kept up in their trees and showed 
not only courage but wanton cruelty and barbar- 
ity. At times they fired upon armed men in 
bodies, but they much preferred for their victims 
the unarmed attendants, the doctors, the chaplains, 
the hospital stewards. They fired at the men who 
were bearing off the wounded in litters ; they fired 
at the doctors who came to the front, and at the 

171 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

chaplains who started to hold burial service ; the 
conspicuous Red Cross brassard worn by all of 
these non-combatants, instead of serving as a pro- 
tection, seemed to make them the special objects 
of the guerilla fire. So annoying did they become 
that I sent out that afternoon and next morning 
a detail of picked sharp-shooters to hunt them out, 
choosing, of course, first-class woodsmen and 
mountain men who were also good shots. My 
sharp-shooters felt very vindictively toward these 
guerillas and showed them no quarter. They 
started systematically to hunt them, and showed 
themselves much superior at the guerillas' own 
game, killing eleven, while not one ot my men 
was scratched. Two of the men who did con- 
spicuously good service in this work were Troop- 
ers Goodwin and Proffit, both of Arizona, but 
one by birth a Californian and the other a 
North Carolinian. Goodwin was a natural shot, 
not only with the rifle and revolver, but with the 
sling. Proffit might have stood as a type of the 
mountaineers described by John Fox and Miss 
Murfree. He was a tall, sinewy, handsome man 
of remarkable strength, an excellent shot and a 
thoroughly good soldier. His father had been a 
Confederate officer, rising from the ranks, and if 
the war had lasted long enough the son would 
have risen in the same manner. As it was, I 



172 



IN THE TRENCHES 

should have been glad to have given him a com- 
mission, exactly as I should have been glad to 
have given a number of others in the regiment 
commissions, if I had only had them. ProfRt was 
a saturnine, reserved man, who afterward fell very 
sick with the fever, and who, as a reward for his 
soldierly good conduct, was often granted unusual 
privileges; but he took the fever and the privi- 
leges with the same iron indifference, never grum- 
bling, and never expressing satisfaction. 

The sharp-shooters returned by nightfall. Soon 
afterward I established my pickets and outposts 
well to the front in the jungle, so as to prevent 
all possibility of surprise. After dark, fires sud- 
denly shot up on the mountain passes far to our 
right. They all rose together and we could 
make nothing of them. After a good deal of 
consultation, we decided they must be some 
signals to the Spaniards in Santiago, from the 
troops marching to reinforce them from without 
— for we were ignorant that the reinforcements 
had already reached the city, the Cubans being 
quite unable to prevent the Spanish regulars from 
marching wherever they wished. While we were 
thus pondering over the watch-fires and attribut- 
ing them to Spanish machinations of some sort, 
it appears that the Spaniards, equally puzzled, 
were setting them down as an attempt at com- 

173 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

munication between the insurgents and our army. 
Both sides were accordingly on the alert, and the 
Spaniards must have strengthened their outlying 
parties in the jungle ahead of us, for they sud- 
denly attacked one of our pickets, wounding 
Crockett seriously. He was brought in by the 
other troopers. Evidently the Spanish lines felt 
a little nervous, for this sputter of shooting was 
immediately followed by a tremendous fire of 
great guns and rifles from their trenches and bat- 
teries. Our men in the trenches responded 
heavily, and word was sent back, not only to me, 
but to the commanders in the rear of the regi- 
ments along our line, that the Spaniards were 
attacking. It was imperative to see what was 
really going on, so I ran up to the trenches and 
looked out. At night it was far easier to place 
the Spanish lines than by day, because the flame- 
spurts shone in the darkness. I could soon tell 
that there were bodies of Spanish pickets or 
skirmishers in the jungle-covered valley, between 
their lines and ours, but that the bulk of the fire 
came from their trenches and showed not the 
slightest symptom of advancing; moreover, as is 
generally the case at night, the fire was almost all 
high, passing well overhead, with an occasional 
bullet near by. 

I came to the conclusion that there was no use 
174 



IN THE TRENCHES 

in our firing back under such circumstances; and 
I could tell that the same conclusion had been 
reached by Captain Ayres of the Tenth Cavalry 
on the right of my line, for even above the crack- 
ino- of the carbines rose the Captain's voice as 
with varied and picturesque language he bade 
his black troopers cease firing. The Captain was 
as absolutely fearless as a man can be. He had 
command of his regimental trenches that night, 
and, having run up at the first alarm, had speedily 
satisfied himself that no particular purpose was 
served by blazing away in the dark, when the 
enormous majority of the Spaniards were simply 
shooting at random from their own trenches, and, 
if they ever had thought of advancing, had cer- 
tainly given up the idea. His troopers were 
devoted to him, would follow him anywhere, and 
would do anything he said; but when men get 
firing at night it is rather difficult to stop them, 
especially when the fire of the enemy in front 
continues unabated. When he first reached the 
trenches it was impossible to say whether or not 
there was an actual night attack impending, and 
he had been instructing his men, as I instructed 
mine, to fire low, cutting the grass in front. As 
soon as he became convinced that there was no 
night attack, he ran up and down the line adjur- 
ing and commanding the troopers to cease shoot- 

^75 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

ing, with words and phrases which were doubtless 
not wholly unlike those which the Old Guard 
really did use at Waterloo. As I ran down my 
own line, I could see him coming up his, and he 
saved me all trouble in stopping the fire at the 
right, where the lines met, for my men there all 
dropped everything to listen to him and cheer 
and laugh. Soon we got the troopers in hand, 
and made them cease firing; then, after awhile, 
the Spanish fire died down. At the time we 
spoke of this as a night attack by the Spaniards, 
but it really was not an attack at all. Ever after 
my men had a great regard for Ayres, and would 
have followed him anywhere. I shall never for- 
get the way in which he scolded his huge, de- 
voted black troopers, generally ending with " I'm 
ashamed of you, ashamed of you ! I wouldn't 
have believed it I Firing ; when I told you to 
stop I I'm ashamed of you I " 

That night we spent in perfecting the trenches 
and arranging entrances to them, doing about as 
much work as we had the preceding night. 
Greenway and Goodrich, from their energy, 
eagerness to do every duty, and great physical 
strength, were peculiarly useful in this work; as, 
indeed, they were in all work. They had been 
up practically the entire preceding night, but they 
were too good men for me to spare them, nor did 

176 



IN THE TRENCHES 

they wish to be spared ; and I kept them up all 
this night too. Goodrich had also been on guard 
as officer of the day the night we were at El 
Poso, so that it turned out that he spent nearly 
four days and three nights with practically hardly 
any sleep at all. 

Next morning, at daybreak, the firing began 
again. This day, the 3d, we suffered nothing, 
save having one man wounded by a sharp-shoot- 
er, and, thanks to the approaches to the trenches, 
we were able to relieve the guards without any 
difficulty. The Spanish sharp-shooters in the 
trees and jungle nearby, however, annoyed us 
very much, and I made preparations to fix them 
next day. With this end in view I chose out 
some twenty first-class men, in many instances 
the same that I had sent after the guerillas, and 
arranged that each should take his canteen and a 
little food. They were to slip into the jungle be- 
tween us and the Spanish lines before dawn next 
morning, and there to spend the day, getting as 
close to the Spanish lines as possible, moving 
about with great stealth, and picking off any hos- 
tile sharp-shooter, as well as any soldier who ex- 
posed himself in the trenches. I had plenty of 
men who possessed a training in wood-craft that 
fitted them for this work; and as soon as the ru- 
mor got abroad what I was planning, volunteers 

177 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

thronged to me. Daniels and Love were two of 
the men always to the front in any enterprise of 
this nature; so were Wadsworth, the two Bulls, 
Fortescue, and Cowdin. But I could not begin 
to name all the troopers who so eagerly craved 
the chance to win honor out of hazard and danger. 

Among them was good, solemn Fred Herrig, 
the Alsatian. I knew Fred's patience and skill as 
a hunter from the trips we had taken together 
after deer and mountain sheep through the Bad 
Lands of the Little Missouri. He still spoke 
English with what might be called Alsatian varia- 
tions — he always spoke of the gun detail as the 
"gondetle," with the accent on the first syllable — 
and he expressed a wish to be allowed "a holiday 
from the gondetle to go after dem gorrillas." I 
told him he could have the holiday, but to his 
great disappointment the truce came first, and 
then Fred asked that, inasmuch as the "gorrillas" 
were now forbidden game, he might be allowed to 
go after guinea hens instead. 

Even after the truce, however, some of my 
sharp-shooters had occupation, for two guerillas in 
our rear took occasional shots at the men who 
were bathing in a pond, until one of our men 
spied them, when they were both speedily brought 
down. One of my riflemen who did best at this 
kind of work, by the way, got into trouble because 

178 



IN THE TRENCHES 

of it. He was much inflated by my commenda- 
tion of him, and when he went back to his troop he 
dechned to obey the first Sergeant's orders on the 
ground that he was "the Colonel's sharp-shooter." 
The Lieutenant in command, being somewhat 
puzzled, brought him to me, and I had to ex- 
plain that if the offence, disobedience of orders in 
face of the enemy, was repeated he might incur 
the death penalty; whereat he looked very crest- 
fallen. That afternoon he got permission, like 
Fred Herrig, to go after guinea-hens, which were 
found wild in some numbers round about; and 
he sent me the only one he got as a peace offer- 
ing. The few guinea-hens thus procured were all 
used for the sick. 

Dr. Church had established a little field hos- 
pital under the shoulder of the hill in our rear. 
He was himself very sick and had almost noth- 
ing in the way of medicine or supplies or appa- 
ratus of any kind, but the condition of the 
wounded in the big field hospitals in the rear was 
so horrible, from the lack of attendants as well 
as of medicines, that we kept all the men we pos- 
sibly could at the front. Some of them had now 
begun to come down with fever. They were all 
very patient, but it was pitiful to see the sick and 
wounded soldiers lying on their blankets, if they 
had any, and if not then simply in the mud, with 

179 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

nothing to eat but hardtack and pork, which of 
course they could not touch when their fever got 
high, and with no chance to get more than the 
rudest attention. Among the very sick here was 
gallant Captain Llewellen. I feared he was going 
to die. We finally had to send him to one of 
the big hospitals in the rear. Doctors Brewer 
and Fuller of the Tenth had been unwearying 
in attending to the wounded, including many of 
those of my regiment. 

At twelve o'clock we were notified to stop fir- 
ing and a flag of truce was sent in to demand the 
surrender of the city. The negotiations gave us 
a breathing spell. 

That afternoon I arranged to get our baggage 
up, sending back strong details of men to carry 
up their own goods, and, as usual, impressing 
into the service a kind of improvised pack-train 
consisting of the officers' horses, of two or three cap- 
tured Spanish cavalry horses, two or three mules 
which had been shot and abandoned and which 
our men had taken and cured, and two or three 
Cuban ponies. Hitherto we had simply been 
sleeping by the trenches or immediately in their 
rear, with nothing in the way of shelter and only 
one blanket to every three or four men. Fortu- 
nately there had been little rain. We now got 
up the shelter tents of the men and some flies 

1 80 



IN THE TRENCHES 

for the hospital and for the officers ; and my per- 
sonal baggage appeared. I celebrated its advent 
by a thorough wash and shave. 

Later, I twice snatched a few hours to go to 
the rear and visit such of my men as I could find 
in the hospitals. Their patience was extraordi- 
nary. Kenneth Robinson, a gallant young trooper, 
though himself severely (I supposed at the time 
mortally) wounded, was noteworthy for the way 
in which he tended those among the wounded 
who were even more helpless, and the cheery 
courage with which he kept up their spirits. 
Gievers, who was shot through the hips, rejoined 
us at the front in a fortnight. Captain Day was 
hardly longer away. Jack Hammer, who, with 
poor Race Smith, a gallant Texas lad who was 
mortally hurt beside me on the summit of the 
hill, had been on kitchen detail, was wounded 
and sent to the rear ; he was ordered to go to the 
United States, but he heard that we were to 
assault Santiago, so he struggled out to rejoin us, 
and thereafter stayed at the front. Cosby, badly 
wounded, made his way down to the sea-coast in 
three days, unassisted. 

With all volunteer troops, and I am inclined 
to think with regulars, too, in time of trial, the 
best work can be got out of the men only if the 
officers endure the same hardships and face the 

i8i 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

same risks. In my regiment, as in the whole 
cavalry division, the proportion of loss in killed 
and wounded was considerably greater among the 
officers than among the troopers, and this was ex- 
actly as it should be. Moreover, when we got 
down to hard pan, we all, officers and men, fared 
exactly alike as regards both shelter and food. 
This prevented any grumbling. When the 
troopers saw that the officers had nothing but 
hardtack, there was not a man in the regiment 
who would not have been ashamed to grumble at 
faring no worse, and when all alike slept out in 
the open, in the rear of the trenches, and when the 
men always saw the field officers up at night, dur- 
ing the digging of the trenches, and going the 
rounds of the outposts, they would not tolerate, in 
any of their number, either complaint or shirking 
work. When things got easier I put up my tent 
and lived a little apart, for it is a mistake for an 
officer ever to grow too familiar with his men, no 
matter how good they are ; and it is of course 
the greatest possible mistake to seek popularity 
either by showing weakness or by mollycoddling 
the men. They will never respect a commander 
who does not enforce discipline, who does not 
know his duty, and who is not willing both him- 
self to encounter and to make them encounter 
every species of danger and hardship when neces- 

182 



IN THE TRENCHES 

sary. The soldiers who do not feel this way are 
not worthy of the name and should be handled 
with iron severity until they become fighting men 
and not shams. In return the officer should care- 
fully look after his men, should see that they are 
well fed and well- sheltered, and that, no matter 
how much they may grumble, they keep the camp 
thoroughly policed. 

After the cessation of the three days' fighting 
we began to get our rations regularly and had 
plenty of hardtack and salt pork, and usually 
about half the ordinary amount of sugar and cof- 
fee. It was not a very good ration for the tropics, 
however, and was of very little use indeed to the 
sick and half sick. On two or three occasions 
during the siege I got my improvised pack-train 
together and either took or sent it down to the 
sea-coast for beans, canned tomatoes, and the like. 
We got these either from the transports which 
were still landing stores on the beach or from the 
Red Cross. If I did not go myself I sent some 
man who had shown that he was a driving, ener- 
getic, tactful fellow, who would somehow get 
what we wanted. Chaplain Brown developed 
great capacity in this line, and so did one of the 
troopers named Knoblauch, he who had dived 
after the rifles that had sunk off the pier at Dai- 
quiri. The supplies of food we got in this way 

183 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

had a very beneficial effect, not only upon the 
nnen's health, but upon their spirits. To the Red 
Cross and similar charitable organizations we owe 
a great deal. We also owed much to Colonel 
Weston of the Commissary Department, who 
always helped us and never let himself be hin- 
dered by red tape ; thus he always let me violate 
the absurd regulation which forbade me, even in 
war time, to purchase food for my men from the 
stores, although letting me purchase for the offi- 
cers. I, of course, paid no heed to the regulation 
when by violating it I could get beans, canned 
tomatoes, or tobacco. Sometimes I used my own 
money, sometimes what was given me by Woody 
Kane, or what was sent me by my brother-in-law, 
Douglas Robinson, or by the other Red Cross 
people in New York. My regiment did not fare 
very well ; but I think it fared better than any 
other. Of course no one would have minded in 
the least such hardships as we endured had there 
been any need of enduring them ; but there was 
none. System and sufficiency of transportation 
were all that were needed. 

On one occasion a foreign military attache vis- 
ited my head-quarters together with a foreign cor- 
respondent who had been through the Turco- 
Greek war. They were both most friendiy critics, 
and as they knew I was aware of this, the corre- 

184 



IN THE TRENCHES 

spondent finally ventured the remark, that he 
thought our soldiers fought even better than the 
Turks, but that on the whole our system of mili- 
tary administration seemed rather worse than that 
of the Greeks. As a nation we had prided our- 
selves on our business ability and adroitness in 
the arts of peace, while outsiders, at any rate, did 
not credit us with any especial warlike prowess ; 
and it was curious that when war came we should 
have broken down precisely on the business and 
administrative side, while the fighting edge of the 
troops certainly left little to be desired. 

I was very much touched by the devotion my 
men showed to me. After they had once become 
convinced that I would share their hardships, they 
made it a point that I should not suffer any hard- 
ships at all ; and I really had an extremely easy 
time. Whether I had any food or not myself 
made no difference, as there were sure to be cer- 
tain troopers, and, indeed, certain troop messes, 
on the lookout for me. If they had any beans 
they would send me over a cupful, or I would 
suddenly receive a present of doughnuts from 
some ex-roundup cook who had succeeded in 
obtaining a little flour and sugar, and if a man 
shot a guinea-hen it was all I could do to make 
him keep half of it for himself Wright, the 
color sergeant, and Henry Bardshar, my orderly, 

185 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

always pitched and struck my tent and built me 
a bunk of bamboo poles, whenever we changed 
camp. So I personally endured very little dis- 
comfort ; for, of course, no one minded the two 
or three days preceding or following each fight, 
when we all had to get along as best we could. 
Indeed, as long as we were under fire or in the 
immediate presence of the enemy, and I had 
plenty to do, there was nothing of which I could 
legitimately complain; and what I really did 
regard as hardships, my men did not object to — 
for later on, when we had some leisure, I would 
have given much for complete solitude and some 
good books. 

Whether there was a truce, or whether, as some- 
times happened, we were notified that there was 
no truce but merely a further cessation of hostil- 
ities by tacit agreement, or whether the fight was 
on, we kept equally vigilant watch, especially at 
night. In the trenches every fourth man kept 
awake, the others sleeping beside or behind him 
on their rifles; and the Cossack posts and pickets 
were pushed out in advance beyond the edge of 
the jungle. At least once a night at some irregu- 
lar hour I tried to visit every part of our line, 
especially if it was dark and rainy, although some- 
times, when the lines were in charge of some of- 
ficer like Wilcox or Kane, Greenway or Good- 

i86 



IN THE TRENCHES 

rich, I became lazy, took off my boots, and slept 
all night through. Sometimes at night I went 
not only along the lines of our own brigade, but 
of the brigades adjoining. It was a matter of 
pride, not only with me, but with all our men, 
that the lines occupied by the Rough Riders 
should be at least as vigilantly guarded as the 
lines of any regular regiment. 

Sometimes at night, when I met other officers 
inspecting their lines, we would sit and talk over 
matters, and wonder what shape the outcome of 
the siege would take. We knew we would capt- 
ure Santiago, but exactly how we would do it 
we could not tell. The failure to establish any 
depot for provisions on the fighting-line, where 
there was hardly ever more than twenty-four hours' 
food ahead, made the risk very serious. If a hur- 
ricane had struck the transports, scattering them 
to the four winds, or if three days of heavy rain 
had completely broken up our communication, 
as they assuredly would have done, we would 
have been at starvation point on the front ; and 
while, of course, we would have lived through it 
somehow and would have taken the city, it 
would only have been after very disagreeable ex- 
periences. As soon as I was able I accumulated 
for my own regiment about forty -eight hours' 
hardtack and salt pork, which I kept so far 

187 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

as possible intact to provide against any emer- 
gency. 

If the city could be taken without direct assault 
on the intrenchments and wire entanglements, we 
earnestly hoped it would be, for such an assault 
meant, as we knew by past experience, the loss of 
a quarter of the attacking regiments (and we were 
bound that the Rough Riders should be one of 
these attacking regiments, if the attack had to be 
made). There was, of course, nobody who would 
not rather have assaulted than have run the risk 
of failure; but we hoped the city would fall with- 
out need arising for us to suffer the great loss of 
life which a further assault would have entailed. 

Naturally, the colonels and captains had nothing 
to say in the peace negotiations which dragged 
along for the week following the sending in the 
flag of truce. Each day we expected either to 
see the city surrender, or to be told to begin fight- 
ing again, and toward the end it grew so irksome 
that we would have welcomed even an assault in 
preference to further inaction. I used to discuss 
matters with the officers of my own regiment now 
and then, and with a few of the officers of the 
neighboring regiments with whom I had struck 
up a friendship — Parker, Stevens, Beck, Ayres 
Morton, and Houghton. I also saw a good deal 
of the excellent officers on the staffs of Generals 

1 88 



IN THE TRENCHES 

Wheeler and Sumner, especially Colonel Dorst, 
Colonel Garlington, Captain Howze, Captain 
Steele, Lieutenant Andrews, and Captain Astor 
Chanler, who, like myself, was a volunteer. 
Chanler was an old friend and a fellow big-game 
hunter, who had done some good exploring 
work in Africa. I always wished I could have 
had him in my regiment. As for Dorst, he 
was peculiarly fitted to command a regiment. 
Although Howze and Andrews were not in my 
brigade, I saw a great deal of them, especially 
of Howze, who would have made a nearly ideal 
regimental commander. They were both natural 
cavalry-men and of most enterprising natures, ever 
desirous of pushing to the front and of taking the 
boldest course. The view Howze always took of 
every emergency (a view which found prompt 
expression in his actions when the opportunity 
offered) made me feel like an elderly conservative. 
The week of non-fighting was not all a period 
of truce; part of the time was passed under a 
kind of nondescript arrangement, when we were 
told not to attack ourselves, but to be ready at 
any moment to repulse an attack and to make 
preparations for meeting it. During these times 
I busied myself in putting our trenches into first- 
rate shape and in building bomb-proofs and trav- 
erses. One night I got a detail of sixty men 

189 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

from the First, Ninth, and Tenth, whose officers 
always helped us in every way, and with these, 
and with sixty of my own men, I dug a long, 
zigzag trench in advance of the salient of my line 
out to a knoll well in front, from which we could 
command the Spanish trenches and block-houses 
immediately ahead of us. On tliis knoll we made 
a kind of bastion consisting of a deep, semi-cir- 
cular trench with sand-bags arranged along the 
edge so as to constitute a wall with loop-holes. 
Of course, when I came to dig this trench, I 
kept both Greenway and Goodrich supervising 
the work all night, and equally of course I got 
Parker and Stevens to help me. By employing 
as many men as we did we were able to get the 
work so far advanced as to provide against inter- 
ruption before the moon rose, which was about 
midnight. Our pickets were thrown far out in 
the jungle, to keep back the Spanish pickets and 
prevent any interference with the diggers. The 
men seemed to think the work rather good fun 
than otherwise, the possibility of a brush with the 
Spaniards lending a zest that prevented its grow- 
ing monotonous. 

Parker had taken two of his Gatlings, removed 
the wheels, and mounted them in the trenches; 
also mounting the two automatic Colts where he 
deemed they could do best service. With the 

190 



IN THE TRENCHES 

completion of the trenches, bomb-proofs, and 
traverses, and the mounting of these guns, the 
fortifications of the hill assumed quite a respect- 
able character, and the Gatling men christened 
it Fort Roosevelt, by which name it afterward 
went* 

During the truce various military attaches and 
foreign officers came out to visit us. Two or 
three of the newspaper men, including Richard 
Harding Davis, Caspar Whitney, and John Fox, 
had already been out to see us, and had been in 
the trenches during the firing. Among the others 
were Captains Lee and Paget of the British army 
and navy, fine fellows, who really seemed to take 
as much pride in the feats of our men as if we 
had been bound together by the ties of a com- 
mon nationality instead of the ties of race and 
speech kinship. Another English visitor was Sir 
Bryan Leighton, a thrice-welcome guest, for he 
most thoughtfully brought to me half a dozen 
little jars of devilled ham and potted fruit, which 
enabled me to summon various officers down to 
my tent and hold a feast. Count von Gotzen, 
and a Norwegian attache, Gedde, very good fel- 
lows both, were also out. One day we were vis- 
ited by a travelling Russian, Prince X., a large, 
blond man, smooth and impenetrable. I intro- 

* See Parker's " With the Catlings at Santiago." 

IQI 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

duced him to one of the regular army officers, a 
capital fighter and excellent fellow, who, how- 
ever, viewed foreign international politics from a 
strictly trans-Mississippi stand-point. He hailed 
the Russian with frank kindness and took him off 
to show him around the trenches, chatting volu- 
bly, and calling him "Prince," much as Ken- 
tuckians call one another " Colonel." As I re- 
turned I heard him remarking : " You see, Prince, 
the great result of this war is that it has united 
the two branches of the Anglo-Saxon people ; 
and now that they are together they can whip the 
world, Prince I they can whip the world I " — being 
evidently filled with the pleasing belief that the 
Russian would cordially sympathize with this 
view. 

The foreign attaches did not always get on well 
with our generals. The two English representa- 
tives never had any trouble, were heartily admired 
by everybody, and, indeed, were generally treated 
as if they were of our own number ; and seem- 
ingly so regarded themselves. But this was not 
always true of the representatives from Continen- 
tal Europe. One of the latter — a very good fel- 
low, by the way — had not altogether approved of 
the way he was treated, and the climax came 
when he said good-by to the General who had 
special charge of him. The General in question 

192 



IN THE TRENCHES 

was not accustomed to nice ethnic distinctions, 
and grouped all of the representatives from Con- 
tinental Europe under the comprehensive title of 
" Dutchmen." When the attache in question 
came to say farewell, the General responded with 
a bluff heartiness, in which perhaps the note of 
sincerity was more conspicuous than that of entire 
good breeding: "Well, good-by; sorry you're 
going; which are you anyhow — the German or 
the Russian *? " 

Shortly after midday on the loth fighting began 
again, but it soon became evident that the Span- 
iards did not have much heart in it. The Ameri- 
can field artillery was now under the command of 
General Randolph, and he fought it effectively. 
A mortar battery had also been established, though 
with an utterly inadequate supply of ammunition, 
and this rendered some service. Almost the only 
Rough Riders who had a chance to do much fir- 
ing were the men with the Colt automatic guns, 
and the twenty picked sharp-shooters, who were 
placed in the newly dug little fort out at the ex- 
treme front. Parker had a splendid time with the 
Gatlings and the Colts. With these machine guns 
he completely silenced the battery in front of us. 
This battery had caused us a good deal of trouble 
at first, as we could not place it. It was imme- 
diately in front of the hospital, from which many 

193 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

Red Cross flags were flying, one of them floating 
just above this battery, from where we looked at 
it. In consequence, for some time, we did not 
know it was a hostile battery at all, as, like all the 
other Spanish batteries, it was using smokeless 
powder. It was only by the aid of powerful 
glasses that we finally discovered its real nature. 
The Gatlings and Colts then actually put it out 
of action, silencing the big guns and the two 
field-pieces. Furthermore, the machine guns and 
our sharp-shooters together did good work in sup- 
plementing the effects of the dynamite gun; for 
when a shell from the latter struck near a Spanish 
trench, or a building in which there were Spanish 
troops, the shock was seemingly so great that the 
Spaniards almost always showed themselves, and 
gave our men a chance to do some execution. 

As the evening of the loth came on, the men 
began to make their coffee in sheltered places. 
By this time they knew how to take care of them- 
selves so well that not a man was touched by 
the Spaniards during the second bombardment. 
While I was lying with the officers just outside 
one of the bomb-proofs I saw a New Mexican 
trooper named Morrison making his coffee under 
the protection of a traverse high up on the hill. 
Morrison was originally a Baptist preacher who 
had joined the regiment purely from a sense ot 

194 




Sergeant Guitilias. a Veteran 
of the Civil War. 

The Standard-bearer <jf the Rough 
Riders, and attached to the dy- 
namite-gun. 




1 > 



W-i' )m^ 



Trooper Morrison, formerly 
a Baptist Minister. 



IN THE TRENCHES 

duty, leaving his wife and children, and had 
shown himself to be an excellent soldier. He 
had evidently exactly calculated the danger zone, 
and found that by getting close to the traverse he 
could sit up erect and make ready his supper 
without being cramped. I watched him solemnly 
pounding the coffee with the butt end of his re- 
volver, and then boiling the water and frying his 
bacon, just as if he had been in the lee of the 
roundup wagon somewhere out on the plains. 

By noon of next day, the nth, my regiment 
with one of the Gatlings was shifted over to the 
right to guard the Caney road. We did no fight- 
ing in our new position, for the last straggling 
shot had been fired by the time we got there. 
That evening there came up the worst storm we 
had had, and by midnight my tent blew over. I 
had for the first time in a fortnight undressed my- 
self completely, and I felt fully punished for my 
love of luxury when I jumped out into the driv- 
ing downpour of tropic rain, and groped blindly 
in the darkness for my clothes as they lay in the 
liquid mud. It was Kane's night on guard, and 
I knew the wretched Woody would be out along 
the line and taking care of the pickets, no matter 
what the storm might be ; and so I basely made 
my way to the kitchen tent, where good Holder- 
man, the Cherokee, wrapped me in dry blankets, 

195 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

and put me to sleep on a table which he had just 
procured from an abandoned Spanish house. 

On the 17th the city formally surrendered and 
our regiment, like the rest of the army, was drawn 
up on the trenches. When the American flag 
was hoisted the trumpets blared and the men 
cheered, and we knew that the fighting part of 
our work was over. 

Shortly after we took our new position the First 
Illinois Volunteers came up on our right. The 
next day, as a result of the storm and of further 
rain, the rivers were up and the roads quagmires, 
so that hardly any food reached the front. My 
regiment was all right, as we had provided for 
just such an emergency; but the Illinois new- 
comers had of course not done so, and they were 
literally without anything to eat. They were fine 
fellows and we could not see them suffer. I fur- 
nished them some beans and coffee for the elder 
officers and two or three cases of hardtack for the 
men, and then mounted my horse and rode down 
to head-quarters, half fording, half swimming the 
streams ; and late in the evening I succeeded in 
getting half a mule-train of provisions for them. 

On the morning of the 3d the Spaniards had 
sent out of Santiago many thousands of women, 
children, and other non-combatants, most of them 
belonging to the poorer classes, but among them 

lq6 




Colonel Roosevelt Visiting Colonel Turner, of the First Illinois Regiment, U. S, V. 



IN THE TRENCHES 

not a few of the best families. These wretched 
creatures took very Httle with them. They came 
through our Hnes and for the most part went to 
El Caney in our rear, where we had to feed them 
and protect them from the Cubans. As we had 
barely enough food for our own men the rations 
of the refugees were scanty indeed and their suf- 
ferings great. Long before the surrender they 
had begun to come to our lines to ask for provi- 
sions, and my men gave them a good deal out of 
their own scanty stores, until I had positively to 
forbid it and to insist that the refugees should 
go to head-quarters ; as, however hard and merci- 
less it seemed, I was in duty bound to keep my 
own regiment at the highest pitch of fighting 
efficiency. 

As soon as the surrender was assured the refu- 
gees came streaming back in an endless squalid 
procession down the Caney road to Santiago. 
My troopers, for all their roughness and their 
ferocity in fight, were rather tender-hearted than 
otherwise, and they helped the poor creatures, 
especially the women and children, in every way, 
giving them food and even carrying the children 
and the burdens borne by the women. I saw one 
man, Happy Jack, spend the entire day in walk- 
ing to and fro for about a quarter of a mile on 
both sides of our lines along the road, carrying 

197 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

the bundles for a series of poor old women, or 
else carrying young children. Finally the doctor 
warned us that we must not touch the bundles of 
the refugees for fear of infection, as disease had 
broken out and was rife among them. Accord- 
ingly I had to put a stop to these acts of kind- 
ness on the part of my men ; against which action 
Happy Jack respectfully but strongly protested 
upon the unexpected ground that " The Almighty 
would never let a man catch a disease while he 
was doing a good action." I did not venture to 
take so advanced a theological stand. 



VI 

THE RETURN HOME 

TWO or three days after the surrender the 
cavalry division was marched back to the 
foothills west of El Caney, and there went into 
camp, together with the artillery. It was a most 
beautiful spot beside a stream of clear water, but 
it was not healthy. In fact no ground in the neigh- 
borhood was healthy. For the tropics the climate 
was not bad, and I have no question but that a 
man who was able to take good care of himself 
could live there all the year round with compara- 
tive impunity ; but the case was entirely different 
with an army which was obliged to suffer great 
exposure, and to live under conditions which al- 
most insured being attacked by the severe mal- 
arial fever of the country. My own men were 
already suffering badly from fever, and they got 
worse rather than better in the new camp. The 
same was true of the other regiments in the cavalry 
division. A curious feature was that the colored 
troops seemed to suffer as heavily as the white. 
From week to week there were slight relative 

199 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

changes, but on the average all the six cavalry 
reghnents, the Rough Riders, the white regulars, 
and the colored regulars seemed to suffer about 
alike, and we were all very much weakened; 
about as much as the regular infantry, although 
naturally not as much as the volunteer infantry. 

Yet even under such circumstances adventu- 
rous spirits managed to make their way out to us. 
In the fortnight following the last bombardment 
of the city I enlisted no less than nine such 
recruits, six being from Harvard, Yale, or Prince- 
ton; and Bull, the former Harvard oar, who had 
been back to the States crippled after the first 
fight, actually got back to us as a stowaway on 
one of the transports, bound to share the luck of 
the regiment, even if it meant yellow fever. 

There were but twelve ambulances with the 
army, and these were quite inadequate for their 
work ; but the conditions in the large field hospi- 
tals were so bad, that as long as possible we kept 
all of our sick men in the regimental hospital 
at the front. Dr. Church did splendid work, 
although he himself was suffering much more 
than half the time from fever. Several of the 
men from the ranks did equally well, especially 
a young doctor from New York, Harry Thorpe, 
who had enlisted as a trooper, but who was now 
made acting assistant-surgeon. It was with the 

200 



THE RETURN HOME 

greatest difficulty that Church and Thorpe were 
able to get proper medicine for the sick, and it 
was almost the last day of our stay before we 
were able to get cots for them. Up to that time 
they lay on the ground. No food was issued 
suitable for them, or for the half-sick men who 
were not on the doctor's list; the two classes by 
this time included the bulk of the command. 
Occasionally we got hold of a wagon or of some 
Cuban carts, and at other times I used my im- 
provised pack-train (the animals of which, how- 
ever, were continually being taken away from us 
by our superiors) and went or sent back to the 
sea-coast at Siboney or into Santiago itself to get 
rice, flour, cornmeal, oatmeal, condensed milk, 
potatoes, and canned vegetables. The rice I 
bought in Santiago; the best of the other stuff I 
got from the Red Cross through Mr. George 
Kennan and Miss Clara Barton and Dr. Less- 
er; but some of it I got from our own trans- 
ports. Colonel Weston, the Commissary-Gen- 
eral, as always, rendered us every service in his 
power. This additional and varied food was of 
the utmost service, not merely to the sick but 
in preventing the well from becoming sick. 
Throughout the campaign the Division Inspector- 
General, Lieutenant-Colonel Garlington, and 
Lieutenants West and Dickman, the acting 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

division quartermaster and commissary, had done 
everything in their power to keep us supphed 
with food; but where there were so few mules 
and wagons even such able and zealous officers 
could not do the impossible. 

We had the camp policed thoroughly, and I 
made the men build little bunks of poles to sleep 
on. By July 23d, when we had been ashore a 
month, we were able to get fresh meat, and from 
that time on we fared well ; but the men were 
already sickening. The chief trouble was the 
malarial fever, which was recurrent. For a few 
days the man would be very sick indeed ; then 
he would partially recover, and be able to go back 
to work ; but after a little time he would be again 
struck down. Every officer other than myself ex- 
cept one was down with sickness at one time or 
another. Even Greenway and Goodrich suc- 
cumbed to the fever and were knocked out for a 
few days. Very {ew of the men indeed retained 
their strength and energy, and though the percent- 
age actually on the sick list never got over twenty, 
there were less than fifty per cent, who were fit for 
any kind of work. All the clothes were in rags ; 
even the officers had neither socks nor underwear. 
The lithe college athletes had lost their spring ; 
the tall, gaunt hunters and cow-punchers lounged 
listlessly in their dog-tents, which were steaming 



THE RETURN HOME 

morasses during the torrential rains, and then 
ovens when the sun blazed down ; but there were 
no complaints. 

Through some blunder our march from the in- 
trenchments to the camp on the foothills, after 
the surrender, was made during the heat of the 
day; and though it was only some live miles 
or thereabouts, very nearly half the men of the 
cavalry division dropped out. Captain Llewellen 
had come back, and led his troop on the march- 
He carried a pick and shovel for one of his sick 
men, and after we reached camp walked back 
with a mule to get another trooper who had fallen 
out from heat exhaustion. The result was that 
the captain himself went down and became ex- 
ceedingly sick. We at last succeeded in sending 
him to the States. I never thought he would 
live, but he did, and when I met him again at 
Montauk Point he had practically entirely recov- 
ered. My orderly, Henry Bardshar, was struck 
down, and though he ultimately recovered, he 
was a mere skeleton, having lost over eighty 
pounds. 

Yellow fever also broke out in the rear, chiefly 
among the Cubans. It never became epidemic, 
but it caused a perfect panic among some of our 
own doctors, and especially in the minds of one 
or two generals and of the home authorities. We 

203 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

found that whenever we sent a man to the rear 
he was decreed to have yellow fever, whereas, if 
we kept him at the front, it always turned out 
that he had malarial fever, and after a few days 
he was back at work again. I doubt if there 
were ever more than a dozen genuine cases of 
yellow fever in the whole cavalry division ; but 
the authorities at Washington, misled by the 
reports they received from one or two of their 
military and medical advisers at the front, became 
panic-struck, and under the influence of their 
fears hesitated to bring the army home, lest it 
might import yellow fever into the United States. 
Their panic was absolutely groundless, as shown 
by the fact that when brought home not a single 
case of yellow fever developed upon American 
soil. Our real foe was not the yellow fever at all, 
but malarial fever, which was not infectious, but 
which was certain, if the troops were left through- 
out the summer in Cuba, to destroy them, either 
killing them outright, or weakening them so that 
they would have fallen victims to any disease 
that attacked them. 

However, for a time our prospects were 

\/ \ gloomy, as the Washington authorities seemed 

determined that we should stay in Cuba. They 

unfortunately knew nothing of the country nor of 

the circumstances of the army, and the plans that 

204 



THE RETURN HOME 

were from time to time formulated in the Depart- 
ment (and even by an occasional general or 
surgeon at the front) for the management of the 
army would have been comic if they had not 
possessed such tragic possibilities. Thus, at one 
period it was proposed that we should shift camp 
every two or three days. Now, our transporta- 
tion, as I have pointed out before, was utterly in- 
adequate. In theory, under the regulations of 
the War Department, each regiment should have 
had at least twenty-five wagons. As a matter of 
fact our regiment often had none, sometimes one, 
rarely two, and never three ; yet it was better off 
than any other in the cavalry division. In con- 
sequence it was impossible to carry much of any- 
thing save what the men had on their backs, and 
half of the men were too weak to walk three 
miles with their packs. Whenever we shifted 
camp the exertion among the half-sick caused 
our sick-roll to double next morning, and it took 
at least three days, even when the shift was for 
but a short distance, before we were able to bring 
up the officers' luggage, the hospital spare food, 
the ammunition, etc. Meanwhile the officers 
slept wherever they could, and those men who 
had not been able to carry their own bedding, 
slept as the officers did. In the weak condition 
of the men the labor of pitching camp was severe 

205 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

and told heavily upon them. In short, the 
scheme of continually shifting camp was impos- 
sible of fulfilment. It would merely have re- 
sulted in the early destruction of the army. 

Again, it was proposed that we should go up 
the mountains and make our camps there. The 
palm and the bamboo grew to the summits of the 
mountains, and the soil along their sides was deep 
and soft, while the rains were very heavy, much 
more so than immediately on the coast — every 
mile or two inland bringing with it a great in- 
crease in the rainfall. We could, with much dif- 
ficulty, have got our regiments up the mountains, 
but not half the men could have got up with their 
belongings; and once there it would have been 
an impossibility to feed them. It was all that 
could be done, with the limited number of wagons 
and mule-trains on hand, to feed the men in the 
existing camps, for the travel and the rain gradu- 
ally rendered each road in succession wholly im- 
passable. To have gone up the mountains would 
have meant early starvation. 

The third plan of the Department was even 
more objectionable than either of the others. 
There was, some twenty-five miles in the interior, 
what was called a high interior plateau, and at 
one period we were informed that we were to be 
marched thither. As a matter of fact, this so- 

206 



THE RETURN HOME 

called high plateau was the sugar-cane country, 
where, during the summer, the rainfoll was pro- 
digious. It was a rich, deep soil, covered with a 
rank tropic growth, the guinea-grass being higher 
than the head of a man on horseback. It was a per- 
fect hotbed of malaria, and there was no dry ground 
whatever in which to camp. To have sent the 
troops there would have been simple butchery. 

Under these circumstances the alternative to 
leaving the country altogether was to stay where 
we were, with the hope that half the men would 
live through to the cool season. We did every- 
thing possible to keep up the spirits of the men, 
but it was exceedingly difficult because there was 
nothing for them to do. They were weak and lan- 
guid, and in the wet heat they had lost energy, so 
that it was not possible for them to indulge in 
sports or pastimes. There were exceptions ; but the 
average man who went off to shoot guinea-hens 
or tried some vigorous game always felt much the 
worse for his exertions. Once or twice I took 
some of my comrades with me, and climbed up 
one or another of the surrounding mountains, but 
the result generally was that half of the party were 
down with some kind of sickness next day. It 
was impossible to take heavy exercise in the heat 
of the day ; the evening usually saw a rain-storm 
which made the country a quagmire ; and in the 

207 




THE ROUGH RIDERS 

early morning the drenching dew and wet, sHmy 
soil made walking but little pleasure. Chaplain 
Brown held service every Sunday under a low 
tree outside my tent ; and we always had a con- 
gregation of a few score troopers, lying or sitting 
round, their strong hard faces turned toward the 
preacher. I let a few of the men visit Santiago, 
but the long walk in and out was very tiring, and, 
moreover, wise restrictions had been put as to 
either officers or men coming in. 

In any event there was very little to do in the 
quaint, dirty old Spanish city, though it was in- 
teresting to go in once or twice, and wander 
through the narrow streets with their curious little 
shops and low houses of stained stucco, with elab- 
orately wrought iron trellises to the windows, and 
curiously carved balconies ; or to sit in the central 
plaza where the cathedral was, and the clubs, and 
the Cafe Venus, and the low, bare, rambling build- 
ing which was called the Governor's Palace. In 
this palace Wood had now been established as 
military governor, and Luna, and two or three of 
my other officers from the Mexican border, who 
knew Spanish, were sent in to do duty under him. 
A great many of my men knew Spanish, and some 
of the New Mexicans were of Spanish origin, 
although they behaved precisely like the other 
members of the regiment. 

208 



THE RETURN HOME 

We should probably have spent the summer 
in our sick camps, losing half the men and hope- 
lessly shattering the health of the remainder, if 
General Shatter had not summoned a council of 
officers, hoping by united action of a more or less 
public character to wake up the Washington au- 
thorities to the actual condition of things. As 
all the Spanish forces in the province of Santiago 
had surrendered, and as so-called immune regi- 
ments were coming to garrison the conquered ter- 
ritory, there was literally not one thing of any 
kind whatsoever for the army to do, and no pur- 
pose to serve by keeping it at Santiago. We 
did not suppose that peace was at hand, being 
ignorant of the negotiations. We were anxious 
to take part in the Porto Rico campaign, and 
would have been more than willing to suffer any 
amount of sickness, if by so doing we could get 
into action. But if we were not to take part in 
the Porto Rico campaign, then we knew it was 
absolutely indispensable to get our commands 
north immediately, if they were to be in trim for 
the great campaign against Havana, which would 
surely be the main event of the winter if peace 
were not declared in advance. 

Our army included the great majority of the 
regulars, and was, therefore, the flower of the 
American force. It was on every account im- 

209 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

perative to keep it in good trim ; and to keep it 
in Santiago meant its entirely purposeless destruc- 
tion. As soon as the surrender was an accom- 
plished fact, the taking away of the army to the 
north should have begun. 

Every officer, from the highest to the lowest, 
especially among the regulars, realized all of this, 
and about the last day of July, General Shafter 
called a conference, in the palace, of all the di- 
vision and brigade commanders. By this time, 
owing to Wood's having been made Governor- 
General, I was in command of my brigade, so I 
went to the conference too, riding in with Gen- 
erals Sumner and Wheeler, who were the other 
representatives of the cavalry division. Besides 
the line officers all the chief medical officers were 
present at the conference. The telegrams from 
the Secretary stating the position of himself and 
the Surgeon-General were read, and then almost 
every line and medical officer present expressed 
his views in turn. They were almost all regulars 
and had been brought up to life-long habits of 
obedience without protest. They were ready to 
obey still, but they felt, quite rightly, that it was 
their duty to protest rather than to see the flower 
of the United States forces destroyed as the cul- 
minating act of a campaign in which the blun- 
ders that had been committed had been retrieved 



THE RETURN HOME 

only by the valor and splendid soldierly qualities 
of the officers and enlisted men of the infantry 
and dismounted cavalry. There was not a dis- 
senting voice; for there could not be. There 
was but one side to the question. To talk of 
continually shifting camp or of moving up the 
mountains or of moving into the interior was 
idle, for not one of the plans could be carried out 
with our utterly insufficient transportation, and at 
that season and in that climate they would merely 
have resulted in aggravating the sickliness of the 
soldiers. It was deemed best to make some rec- 
ord of our opinion, in the shape of a letter or 
report, which would show that to keep the army 
in Santiago meant its absolute and objectless ruin, 
and that it should at once be recalled. At first 
there was naturally some hesitation on the part of 
the regular officers to take the initiative, for their 
entire future career might be sacrificed. So I 
wrote a letter to General Shafter, reading over the 
rough draft to the various Generals and adopting 
their corrections. Before I had finished making 
these corrections it was determined that we should 
send a circular letter on behalf of all of us to 
General Shafter, and when I returned from pre- 
senting him mine, I found this circular letter al- 
ready prepared and we all of us signed it. Both 
letters were made public. The result was imme- 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

diate. Within three days the army was ordered 
to be ready to sail for home. 

As soon as it was known that we were to sail 
for home the spirits of the men changed for the 
better. In my regiment the officers began to plan 
methods of drilling the men on horseback, so as 
to fit them for use against the Spanish cavalry, if 
we should go against Havana in December. We 
had, all of us, eyed the captured Spanish cavalry 
with particular interest. The men were small, 
and the horses, though well trained and well 
built, were diminutive ponies, very much smaller 
than cow ponies. We were certain that if we 
ever got a chance to try shock tactics against 
them they would go down like nine-pins, pro- 
vided only that our men could be trained to 
charge in any kind of line, and we made up our 
minds to devote our time to this. Dismounted 
work with the rifle we already felt thoroughly 
competent to perform. 

My time was still much occupied with looking 
after the health of my brigade, but the fact that 
we were going home, where I knew that their 
health would improve, lightened my mind, and 
I was able thoroughly to enjoy the beauty of the 
country, and even of the storms, which hitherto I 
had regarded purely as enemies. 

The surroundings of the city of Santiago are 



THE RETURN HOME 

very grand. The circling mountains rise sheer 
and high. The plains are threaded by rapid 
winding brooks and are dotted here and there 
with quaint villages, curiously picturesque from 
their combining traces of an outworn old-world 
civilization with new and raw barbarism. The 
tall, graceful, feathery bamboos rise by the water's 
edge, and elsewhere, even on the mountain-crests, 
where the soil is wet and rank enough ; and the 
splendid royal palms and cocoanut palms tower 
high above the matted green jungle. 

Generally the thunder-storms came in the after- 
noon, but once I saw one at sunrise, driving down 
the high mountain valleys toward us. It was a 
very beautiful and almost terrible sight ; for the 
sun rose behind the storm, and shone through the 
gusty rifts, lighting the mountain-crests here and 
there, while the plain below lay shrouded in the 
lingering night. The angry, level rays edged the 
dark clouds with crimson, and turned the down- 
pour into sheets of golden rain ; in the valleys the 
glimmering mists were tinted every wild hue ; and 
the remotest heavens were lit with flaming glory. 

One day General Lawton, General Wood and 
I, with Ferguson and poor Tiffany, went down the 
bay to visit Morro Castle. The shores were beau- 
tiful, especially where there were groves of palms 
and of the scarlet-flower tree, and the castle itself, 

213 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

on a jutting headland, overlooking the sea and 
guarding the deep, narrow entrance to the bay, 
showed just what it was, the splendid relic of a 
vanished power and a vanished age. We wan- 
dered all through it, among the castellated battle- 
ments, and in the dungeons, where we found hide- 
ous rusty implements of torture ; and looked at 
the guns, some modern and some very old. It 
had been little hurt by the bombardment of the 
ships. Afterward I had a swim, not trusting 
much to the shark stories. We passed by the 
sunken hulks of the Merrimac and the Reina 
Mercedes, lying just outside the main channel. 
Our own people had tried to sink the first and 
the Spaniards had tried to sink the second, so as 
to block the entrance. Neither attempt was suc- 
cessful. 

On August 6th we were ordered to embark, and 
next morning we sailed on the transport Miami. 
General Wheeler was with us and a squadron of 
the Third Cavalry under Major Jackson. The 
General put the policing and management of the 
ship into my hands, and I had great aid from 
Captain McCormick, who had been acting with 
me as adjutant-general of the brigade. I had prof- 
ited by my experience coming down, and as Dr. 
Church knew his work well, although he was very 
sick, we kept the ship in such good sanitary con- 

214 



THE RETURN HOME 

dition, that we were one of the very few organiza- 
tions allowed to land at Montauk immediately 
upon our arrival. 

Soon after leaving port the captain of the ship 
notified me that his stokers and engineers were 
insubordinate and drunken, due, he thought, to 
liquor which my men had given them. I at once 
started a search of the ship, explaining to the men 
that they could not keep the liquor; that if they 
surrendered whatever they had to me I should 
return it to them when we went ashore ; and that 
meanwhile I would allow the sick to drink when 
they really needed it ; but that if they did not 
give the liquor to me of their own accord I 
would throw it overboard. About seventy flasks 
and bottles were handed to me, and I found and 
threw overboard about twenty. This at once put 
a stop to all drunkenness. The stokers and en- 
gineers were sullen and half mutinous, so I sent a 
detail of my men down to watch them and see 
that they did their work under the orders of the 
chief engineer; and we reduced them to obedi- 
ence in short order. I could easily have drawn 
from the regiment sufficient skilled men to fill 
every position in the entire ship's crew, from cap- 
tain to stoker. 

We were very much crowded on board the 
ship, but rather better off than on the Yucatan, so 

215 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

far as the men were concerned, which was the im- 
portant point. All the officers except General 
Wheeler slept in a kind of improvised shed, not 
unlike a chicken coop with bunks, on the after- 
most part of the upper deck. The water was 
bad — some of it very bad. There was no ice. 
The canned beef proved practically uneatable, as 
we knew would be the case. There were not 
enough vegetables. We did not have enough 
disinfectants, and there was no provision what- 
ever for a hospital or for isolating the sick ; we 
simply put them on one portion of one deck. 
If, as so many of the high authorities had insisted, 
there had really been a yellow-fever epidemic, 
and if it had broken out on shipboard, the con- 
dition would have been frightful ; but there was 
no yellow-fever epidemic. Three of our men 
had been kept behind as suspects, all three suffer- 
ing simply from malarial fever. One of them, 
Lutz, a particularly good soldier, died; another, 
who was simply a malingerer and had nothing the 
matter with him whatever, of course recovered ; 
the third was Tiffany who, I believe, would have 
lived had we been allowed to take him with us, 
but who was sent home later and died soon after 
landing. 

I was very anxious to keep the men amused, 
and as the quarters were so crowded that it was 

216 



THE RETURN HOME 

out of the question for them to have any physical 
exercise, I did not interfere with their playing 
games of chance so long as no disorder followed. 
On shore this was not allowed ; but in the par- 
ticular emergency which we were meeting, the 
loss of a month's salary was as nothing compared 
to keeping the men thoroughly interested and 
diverted. 

By care and diligence we succeeded in pre- 
venting any serious sickness. One man died, 
however. He had been suffering from dysentery 
ever since we landed, owing purely to his own 
fault, for on the very first night ashore he obtained 
a lot of fiery liquor from some of the Cubans, got 
very drunk, and had to march next day through 
the hot sun before he was entirely sober. He 
never recovered, and was useless from that time 
on. On board ship he died, and we gave him sea 
burial. Wrapped in a hammock, he was placed 
opposite a port, and the American flag thrown 
over him. The engine was stilled, and the great 
ship rocked on the waves unshaken by the screw, 
while the war-worn troopers clustered around with 
bare heads, to listen to Chaplain Brown read the 
funeral service, and to the band of the Third 
Cavalry as it played the funeral dirge. Then the 
port was knocked free, the flag withdrawn, and 
the shotted hammock plunged heavily over the 

217 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

side, rushing down through the dark water to lie, 
till the Judgment Day, in the ooze that holds the 
timbers of so many gallant ships, and the bones 
of so many fearless adventurers. 

We were favored by good weather during our 
nine days' voyage, and much of the time when 
there was little to do we simply sat together and 
talked, each man contributing from the fund of 
his own experiences. Voyages around Cape 
Horn, yacht races for the America's cup, experi- 
ences on foot-ball teams which are famous in the 
annals of college sport; more serious feats ot 
desperate prowess in Indian fighting and in break- 
ing up gangs of white outlaws; adventures in 
hunting big game, in breaking wild horses, in 
tending great herds of cattle, and in wandering 
winter and summer among the mountains and 
across the lonely plains — the men who told the 
tales could draw upon countless memories such 
as these of the things they had done and the 
things they had seen others do. Sometimes 
General Wheeler joined us and told us about the 
great war, compared with which ours was such 
a small war — far-reaching in their importance 
though its effects were destined to be. When we 
had become convinced that we would escape an 
epidemic of sickness the homeward voyage 
became very pleasant. 

218 



THE RETURN HOME 

On the eve of leaving Santiago I had received 

from Mr. Laffan of the Sun^ a cable with the 
single word " Peace," and we speculated much 
on this, as the clumsy transport steamed slowly 
northward across the trade wind and then into 
the Gulf Stream. At last we sighted the low, 
sandy bluffs of the Long Island coast, and late 
on the afternoon of the 14th we steamed through 
the still waters of the Sound and cast anchor off 
Montauk. A gun-boat of the Mosquito fleet 
came out to greet us and to inform us that peace 
negotiations had begun. 

Next morning we were marched on shore. 
Many of the men were very sick indeed. Of the 
three or four who had been closest to me among 
the enlisted men, Color-Sergeant Wright was the 
only one in good health. Henry Bardshar was a 
wreck, literally at death's door. I was myself in 
first-class health, all the better for having lost 
twenty pounds. Faithful Marshall, my colored 
body-servant, was so sick as to be nearly helpless. 

Bob Wrenn nearly died. He had joined us 
very late and we could not get him a Krag car- 
bine; so I had given him my Winchester, which 
carried the government cartridge; and when he 
was mustered out he carried it home in triumph, 
to the envy of his fellows, who themselves had to 
surrender their beloved rifles. 

219 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

For the first few days there was great confusion 
and some want even after we got to Montauk. 
The men in hospitals suffered from lack of almost 
everything, even cots. But after these few days 
we were very well cared for and had abundance 
of all we needed, except that on several occasions 
there was a shortage of food for the horses, which 
I should have regarded as even more serious than 
a shortage for the men, had it not been that we 
were about to be disbanded. The men lived high, 
with milk, eggs, oranges, and any amount of 
tobacco, the lack of which during portions of the 
Cuban campaign had been felt as seriously as any 
lack of food. One of the distressing features of 
the malarial fever which had been ravaging the 
troops was that it was recurrent and persistent. 
Some of my men died after reaching home, and 
many were very sick. We owed much to the 
kindness not only of the New York hospitals and 
the Red Cross and kindred societies, but of indi- 
viduals, notably Mr. Bayard Cutting and Mrs. 
Armitage, who took many of our men to their 
beautiful Long Island homes. 

On the whole, however, the month we spent 
at Montauk before we disbanded was very pleas- 
ant. It was good to meet the rest of the regi- 
ment. They all felt dreadfully at not having 
been in Cuba. It was a sore trial to men who 

320 




u 



f- 



THE RETURN HOME 

had given up much to go to the war, and who 
rebelled at nothing in the way of hardship or suf- 
fering, but who did bitterly feel the fact that their 
sacrifices seemed to have been useless. Of course 
those who stayed had done their duty precisely 
as did those who went, for the question of glory 
was not to be considered in comparison to the 
faithful performance of whatever was ordered ; 
and no distinction of any kind was allowed in the 
regiment between those whose good fortune it 
had been to go and those whose harder fate it had 
been to remain. Nevertheless the latter could 
not be entirely comforted. 

The regiment had three mascots ; the two most 
characteristic — a young mountain lion brought 
by the Arizona troops, and a war eagle brought 
by the New Mexicans — we had been forced to 
leave behind in Tampa. The third, a rather dis- 
reputable but exceedingly knowing little dog 
named Cuba, had accompanied us through all 
the vicissitudes of the campaign. The mountain 
lion, Josephine, possessed an infernal temper; 
whereas both Cuba and the eagle, which have 
been named in my honor, were extremely good- 
humored. Josephine was kept tied up. She 
sometimes escaped. One cool night in early Sep- 
tember she wandered off and, entering the tent 
of a Third Cavalry man, got into bed with him ; 

221 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

whereupon he fled into the darkness with yells, 
much more unnerved than he would have been 
by the arrival of any number of Spaniards. The 
eagle was let loose and not only walked at will 
up and down the company streets, but also at 
times flew wherever he wished. He was a young 
bird, having been taken out of his nest when a 
fledgling. Josephine hated him and was always 
trying to make a meal of him, especially when 
we endeavored to take their photographs together. 
The eagle, though good-natured, was an entirely 
competent individual and ready at any moment 
to beat Josephine off. Cuba was also oppressed 
at times by Josephine, and was of course no match 
for her, but was frequently able to overawe by 
simple decision of character. 

In addition to the animal mascots, we had two 
or three small boys who had also been adopted 
by the regiment. One, from Tennessee, was 
named Dabney Royster. When we embarked 
at Tampa he smuggled himself on board the 
transport with a 22-calibre rifle and three boxes 
of cartridges, and wept bitterly when sent ashore. 
The squadron which remained behind adopted 
him, got him a little Rough Rider's uniform, and 
made him practically one of the regiment. 

The men who had remained at Tampa, like 
ourselves, had suffered much from fever, and 

222 



THE RETURN HOME 

the horses were in bad shape. So many of the 
men were sick that none of the regiments began 
to drill for some time after reaching Montauk. 
There was a great deal of paper-work to be done ; 
but as I still had charge of the brigade only a 
little of it fell on my shoulders. Of this I was 
sincerely glad, for I knew as little of the paper- 
work as my men had originally known of drill. 
We had all of us learned how to fight and march ; 
but the exact limits of our rights and duties in 
other respects were not very clearly defined in 
our minds ; and as for myself, as I had not had 
the time to learn exactly what they were, I had 
assumed a large authority in giving rewards and 
punishments. In particular I had looked on 
court-martials much as Peter Bell looked on 
primroses — they were court-martials and nothing 
more, whether resting on the authority of a lieu- 
tenant-colonel or of a major-general. The muster- 
ing-out officer, a thorough soldier, found to his 
horror that I had used the widest discretion both 
in imposing heavy sentences which I had no 
power to impose on men who shirked their 
duties, and, where men atoned for misconduct 
by marked gallantry, in blandly remitting sen- 
tences approved by my chief of division. How- 
ever, I had done substantial, even though some- 
what rude and irregular, justice — and no harm 

223 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

could result, as we were just about to be mus- 
tered out. 

My chief duties were to see that the camps of 
the three regiments were thoroughly policed and 
kept in first-class sanitary condition. This took 
up some time, of course, and there were other 
matters in connection with the mustering out 
which had to be attended to ; but I could always 
get two or three hours a day free from work. 
Then I would summon a number of the officers, 
Kane, Greenway, Goodrich, Church, Ferguson, 
Mcllhenny, Frantz, Ballard and others, and we 
would gallop down to the beach and bathe in the 
surf, or else go for long rides over the beautiful 
rolling plains, thickly studded with pools which 
were white with water-lilies. Sometimes I went 
off alone with my orderly, young Gordon John- 
ston, one of the best men in the regiment ; he 
was a nephew of the Governor of Alabama, and 
when at Princeton had played on the eleven. 
We had plenty of horses, and these rides were 
most enjoyable. Galloping over the open, rolling 
country, through the cool fall evenings, made us 
feel as if we were out on the great Western plains 
and might at any moment start deer from the 
brush, or see antelope stand and gaze, far away, 
or rouse a band of mighty elk and hear their 
horns clatter as they tied. 

224 



THE RETURN HOME 

An old friend, Baron von Sternberg, of the 
German Embassy, spent a week in camp with me. 
He had served, when only seventeen, in the 
Franco-Prussian War as a hussar, and was a noted 
sharp-shooter — being "the little baron" who is 
the hero of Archibald Forbes's true story of " The 
Pig-dog." He and I had for years talked over 
the possibilities of just such a regiment as the 
one I was commanding, and he was greatly inter- 
ested in it. Indeed I had vainly sought permis- 
sion from the German ambassador to take him 
with the regiment to Santiago. 

One Sunday before the regiment disbanded I 
supplemented Chaplain Brown's address to the 
men by a short sermon of a rather hortatory char- 
acter. I told them how proud I was of them, 
but warned them not to think that they could 
now go back and rest on their laurels, bidding 
them remember that though for ten days or so 
the world would be willing to treat them as he- 
roes, yet after that time they would find they had 
to get down to hard work just like everyone else, 
unless they were willing to be regarded as worth- 
less do-nothings. They took the sermon in good 
part, and I hope that some of them profited by 
it. At any rate, they repaid me by a very much 
more tangible expression of affection. One after- 
noon, to my genuine surprise, I was asked out of 

225 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

my tent by Lieutenant-Colonel Brodie (the gal- 
lant old boy had rejoined us), and found the 
whole regiment formed in hollow square, with the 
officers and color-sergeant in the middle. When 
I went in, one of the troopers came forward and 
on behalf of the regiment presented me with 
Remington's fine bronze, " The Bronco-buster." 
There could have been no more appropriate gift 
from such a regiment, and I was not only pleased 
with it, but very deeply touched with the feeling 
which made them join in giving it. Afterward 
they all filed past and I shook the hands of each 
to say good-by. 

Most of them looked upon the bronze with 
the critical eyes of professionals. I doubt if 
there was any regiment in the world which con- 
tained so large a number of men able to ride the 
wildest and most dangerous horses. One day 
while at Montauk Point some of the troopers of 
the Third Cavalry were getting ready for mounted 
drill when one of their horses escaped, having 
thrown his rider. This attracted the attention of 
some of our men and they strolled around to see 
the trooper remount. He was instantly thrown 
again, the horse, a huge, vicious sorrel, being one 
of the worst buckers I ever saw ; and none of his 
comrades were willing to ride the animal. Our 
men, of course, jeered and mocked at them, and 

226 







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THE RETURN HOME 

in response were dared to ride the horse them- 
selves. The challenge was instantly accepted, the 
only question being as to which of a dozen noted 
bronco-busters who were in the ranks should un- 
dertake the task. They finally settled on a man 
named Darnell. It was agreed that the experi- 
ment should take place next day when the horse 
would be fresh, and accordingly next day the 
majority of both regiments turned out on a big 
open flat in front of my tent — brigade head-quar- 
ters. The result was that, after as fine a bit of 
rough riding as one would care to see, in which 
one scarcely knew whether most to wonder at the 
extraordinary viciousness and agile strength of 
the horse or at the horsemanship and courage of 
the rider, Darnell came off victorious, his seat 
never having been shaken. After this almost 
every day we had exhibitions of bronco-busting, 
in which all the crack riders of the regiment vied 
with one another, riding not only all of our own 
bad horses but any horse which was deemed bad 
in any of the other regiments. 

Darnell, McGinty, Wood, Smoky Moore, and 
a score of others took part in these exhibitions, 
which included not merely feats in mastering vi- 
cious horses, but also feats of broken horses which 
the riders had trained to lie down at command, and 
upon which they could mount while at full speed. 

227 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

Toward the end of die time we also had 
mounted drill on two or three occasions; and 
when the President visited the camp we turned 
out mounted to receive him as did the rest of the 
cavalry. The last night before we were mus- 
tered out was spent in noisy, but entirely harm- 
less hilarity, which I ignored. Every form of 
celebration took place in the ranks. A former 
Populist candidate for Attorney-General in Colo' 
rado delivered a fervent oration in favor of free 
silver ; a number of the college boys sang ; but 
most of the men gave vent to their feelings by 
improvir.;d dances. In these the Indians took 
the lead, pure bloods and half-breeds alike, the 
cowboys and miners cheerfully joining in and 
forming part of the howling, gruntmg rings, that 
went bounding around the great fires they had 
kindled. 

Next morning Sergeant Wright took down the 
colors, and Sergeant Guitilias the standard, for 
the last time ; the horses, the rifles, and the rest 
of the regimental property had been turned in ; 
officers and men shook hands and said good-by 
to one another, and then they scattered to their 
homes in the North and the South, the few going 
back to the great cities of the East, the many 
turning again toward the plains, the mountains, 
and the deserts of the West and the strange 

228 





Color-Sergeant A. P. Wright. 



THE RETURN HOME 

Southwest. This was on September 15th, the 
day which marked the close of the four months' 
life of a regiment of as gallant fighters as ever 
wore the United States uniform. 

The regiment was a wholly exceptional volun- 
teer organization, and its career cannot be taken 
as in any way a justification for the belief that 
the average volunteer regiment approaches the 
average regular regiment in point of efficiency un- 
til it has had many months of active service. In 
the first place, though the regular regiments may 
differ markedly among themselves, yet the range 
of variation among them is nothing like so wide 
as that among volunteer regiments, where at first 
there is no common standard at all ; the very best 
being, perhaps, up to the level of the regulars (as 
has recently been shown at Manila), while the 
very worst are no better than mobs, and the great 
bulk come in between."^ The average regular 
regiment is superior to the average volunteer regi- 
ment in the physique of the enlisted men, who 
have been very carefully selected, who have been 
trained to life in the open, and who know how to 
cook and take care of themselves generally. 

Now, in all these respects, and in others like 

* For sound common-sense about the volunteers see Parker's ex- 
cellent little book, " The Catlings at Santiago." 

229 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

them, the Rough Riders were the equals of the 
regulars. They were hardy, self-reliant, accus- 
tomed to shift for themselves in the open under 
very adverse circumstances. The two all-import- 
ant qualifications for a cavalryman, are riding and 
shooting — the modern cavalryman being so often 
used dismounted, as an infantryman. The aver- 
age recruit requires a couple of years before he 
becomes proficient in horsemanship and marks- 
manship; but my men were already good shots 
and first-class riders when they came into the 
regiment. The difference as regards officers and 
non-commissioned officers, between regulars and 
volunteers, is usually very great; but in my regi- 
ment (keeping in view the material we had to 
handle), it was easy to develop non-commissioned 
officers out of men who had been round-up fore- 
men, ranch foremen, mining bosses, and the like. 
These men were intelligent and resolute ; they 
knew they had a great deal to learn, and they set 
to work to learn it; while they were already 
accustomed to managing considerable interests, to 
obeying orders, and to taking care of others as 
well as themselves. 

As for the officers, the great point in our favor 
was the anxiety they showed to learn from those 
among their number who, like Capron, had 
already served in the regular army; and the fact 

230 



THE RETURN HOME 

that we had chosen a regular army man as Colo- 
nel. If a volunteer organization consists of good 
material, and is eager to learn, it can readily do 
so if it has one or two first-class regular officers to 
teach it. Moreover, most of our captains and 
lieutenants were men who had seen much of wild 
life, who were accustomed to handling and com- 
manding other men, and who had usually already 
been under fire as sheriffs, marshals, and the like. 
As for the second in command, myself, I had 
served three years as captain in the National 
Guard; I had been deputy sheriff in the cow 
country, where the position was not a sinecure ; 
I was accustomed to big game hunting and to 
work on a cow ranch, so that I was thoroughly 
familiar with the use both of horse and rifle, 
and knew how to handle cowboys, hunters, and 
miners; finally, I had studied much in the litera- 
ture of war, and especially the literature of the 
. great modern wars, like our own Civil War, the 
Franco-German War, the Turco-Russian War; 
and I was especially familiar with the deeds, the 
successes and failures alike, of the frontier horse 
riflemen who had fought at King's Mountain 
and the Thames, and on the Mexican border. 
Finally, and most important of all, officers and 
men alike were eager for fighting, and resolute 
to do well and behave properly, to encounter 

231 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

hardship and privation, and the irksome monot- 
ony of camp routine, without grumbHng or 
complaining; they had counted the cost before 
they went in, and were dehghted to pay the 
penalties inevitably attendant upon the career of 
a fighting regiment; and from the moment when 
the regiment began to gather, the higher officers 
kept instilling into those under them the spirit of 
eagerness for action and of stern determination to 
grasp at death rather than forfeit honor. 

The self-reliant spirit of the men was well shown 
after they left the regiment. Of course, there 
were a few weaklings among them; and there 
were others, entirely brave and normally self-suffi- 
cient, who, from wounds or fevers, were so re- 
duced that they had to apply for aid — or at least, 
who deserved aid, even though they often could 
only be persuaded with the greatest difficulty to 
accept it. The widows and orphans had to be 
taken care of There were a few light-hearted 
individuals, who were entirely ready to fight in 
time of war, but in time of peace felt that some- 
body ought to take care of them ; and there were 
others who, never having seen any aggregation 
of buildings larger than an ordinary cow-town, fell 
a victim to the fascinations of New York. But, 
as a whole, they scattered out to their homes on 
the disbandment of tlie regiment ; gaunter than 

232 



THE RETURN HOME 

when they had enHsted, sometimes weakened by 
fever or wounds, but just as full as ever of sullen, 
sturdy capacity for self-help ; scorning to ask for 
aid, save what was entirely legitimate in the way 
of one comrade giving help to another. A num- 
ber of the examining surgeons, at the muster-out, 
spoke to me with admiration of the contrast 
offered by our regiment to so many others, in the 
fact that our men always belittled their own bod- 
ily injuries and sufferings ; so that whereas the sur- 
geons ordinarily had to be on the look-out lest a 
man who was not really disabled should claim to 
be so, in our case they had to adopt exactly the 
opposite attitude and guard the future interests of 
the men, by insisting upon putting upon their 
certificates of discharge whatever disease they had 
contracted or wound they had received in line of 
duty. Major J. H. Calef, who had more than 
any other one man to do with seeing to the proper 
discharge papers of our men, and who took a most 
generous interest in them, wrote me as follows : 
" I also wish to bring to your notice the fortitude 
displayed by the men of your regiment, who have 
come before me to be mustered out of service, in 
making their personal declarations as to their 
physical conditions. Men who bore on their 
faces and in their forms the traces of long days of 
illness, indicating wrecked constitutions, declared 

233 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

that nothing was the matter with them, at the 
same time disclaiming any intention of applying 
for a pension. It was exceptionally heroic." 

When we were mustered out, many of the 
men had lost their jobs, and were too weak to 
go to work at once, while there were helpless de- 
pendents of the dead to care for. Certain of my 
friends, August Belmont, Stanley and Richard 
Mortimer, Major Austin Wadsworth — himself 
fresh from the Manila campaign — Belmont Tif- 
fany, and others, gave me sums of money to be 
used for helping these men. In some instances, 
by the exercise of a good deal of tact and by 
treating the gift as a memorial of poor young 
Lieutenant Tiffany, we got the men to accept 
something; and, of course, there were a number 
who, quite rightly, made no difficulty about ac- 
cepting. But most of the men would accept no 
help whatever. In the first chapter, I spoke of a 
lady, a teacher in an academy in the Indian Ter- 
ritory, three or four of whose pupils had come 
into my regiment, and who had sent with them a 
letter of introduction to me. When the regi- 
ment disbanded, I wrote to her to ask if she could 
not use a little money among the Rough Riders, 
white, Indian, and half-breed, that she might per- 
sonally know. I did not hear from her for some 
time, and then she wrote as follows : 

234 



THE RETURN HOME 

" Muscogee, Ind. Ter., 
"December 19, 1898. 

•* My Dear Colonel Roosevelt : I did not at once re- 
ply to vour letter of September 23 d, because I waited for a 
time to see if there should be need among any of our Rough 
Riders, of the money you so kindly offered. Some of the boys 
are poor, and in one or two cases they seemed to me really needy, 
but they all said no. More than once I saw the tears come 
to their eyes, at thought of your care for them, as I told them 
of your letter. Did you hear any echoes of our Indian war- 
whoops over your election ? They were pretty loud. I was 
particularly exultant, because my father was a New Yorker and 
I was educated in New York, even if I was born here. So far 
as I can learn, the boys are taking up the dropped threads of 
their lives, as though they had never been away. Our two 
Rough Rider students, Meagher and Gilmore, are doing well in 
their college work. 

'* I am sorry to tell you of the death of one of your most de- 
voted troopers, Bert Holderman, who was here serving on the 
Grand Jury. He was stricken with meningitis in the jury-room, 
and died after three days of delirium. His father, who was 
twice wounded, four times taken prisoner, and fought in thirty- 
two battles of the civil war, now old and feeble, survives him, 
and it was indeed pathetic to see his grief. Bert's mother, who 
is a Cherokee, was raised in my grandfather's family. The 
words of commendation which you wrote upon Bert's discharge 
are the greatest comfort to his friends. They wanted you to 
know of his death, because he loved you so. 

** I am planning to entertain all the Rough Riders in this 
vicinity some evening during my holiday vacation. I mean to 
have no other guests, but only give them an opportunity for 
reminiscences. I regret that Bert's death makes one less. I 

235 



THE ROUGH RIDERS 

had hoped to have them sooner, but our struggling young col- 
lege salaries are necessarily small and duties arduous. I make 
a home for my widowed mother and an adopted Indian daugh- 
ter, who is in school ; and as I do the cooking for a family of 
five, I have found it impossible to do many things I would like 
to. 

** Pardon me for burdening you with these details, but I sup- 
pose I am like your boys, who say, * The Colonel was always 
as ready to listen to a private as to a major-general.' 

" Wishing you and yours the very best gifts the season can 
bring, I am, 

** Very truly yours, 

** Alice M. Robertson. " 

Is it any wonder that I loved my regiment^ 



236 



APPENDICES 



APPENDIX A 

MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

[Owing to the circumstances of the regiment's service, 
the paperwork was very difficult to perform. This muster- 
out roll is very defective in certain points, notably in the 
enumeration of the wounded who had been able to return 
to duty. Some of the dead are also undoubtedly passed 
over. Thus I have put in Race Smith, Sanders, and 
Tiffany as dead, correcting the rolls ; but there are doubt- 
less a number of similar corrections which should be made 
but have not been, as the regiment is now scattered far and 
wide. I have also corrected the record for the wounded 
men in one or two places where I happen to remember it ; 
but there are a number of the wounded, especially the 
slightly wounded, who are not down at all] 



238 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



FIELD, STAFF, AND BAND. 

Theodore Roosevelt. . Colonel New York, N. Y. 

Alexander O. Brodie. .Lieut. Colonel . . . Prescott, Ariz. 

Henry B. Hersey Major Santa F^, N. M. 

Geort,'-e M. Dunn .... Major Denver, Col. 

Micah J. Jenkins Major Youngs Is., S. C. 

Henry A. Brown Chaplain Prescott, Ariz. 

Maxwell Keyes ist Lt. & Adjt. . .San Antonio, Te.x. 

Sherrard Coleman. . . . ist Lt. & Q. M. .Santa F^, N. M. 

Ernest Seeker Sergt. Major Los Angeles, Cal. 

Matthew Douthett Q. M. Sergeant . Denver, Col. 

Clay Piatt Cf. Trumpeter. . . San Antonio, Tex. 

Joseph F. Kansky Sad. Sergeant. . .Tacoma, Wash. 

Leonard Wood Colonel Cape Cod, Mass. 

Promoted, July 9. 1898, to Brig. -Gen. of U. S. Vols. 

Thomas W. Hall ist Lieut. & Adjt. 

Tendered his resignation as ist Lieut, and Adjt., which took effect 

Aug. 1. 1898, in compliance with S. O. No. 175, O. G. O., dated July 

29, 1898. 

Jacob Schwaizer ist Lt. & Q. M. .El Reno, O. T. 

Resigned his commission as ist Lieut., Aug. 4, 1808 Resienation 
took effect Sept. 7, 1898. 

Joseph A. Carr Sergt. Major . . Washington, D. C. 

Discharged at San Antonio. Texas, by way of favor \o enable him to 
accept a commission as ist Lieut, in the Regiment, May 19, 1898. 

Chri.stian Madsen R. Q. M. Sergt . . El Reno. O. T. ' 

Discharged on Surgeon's certificate of disability at Camp Wikoff L. 
I., Aug. 26, 1898. ' 

Alfred E. Lewis R. Q. M. Sergt. 

Deserted from Camp at San Antonio, Tex., on or about Mays. 1898- 
Ernest Haskell Cadet West Point . 

Acted with regiment as second lieutenant. Dangerously wounded by 
Mauser bullet, July ist. 

THE HOSPITAL CORPS. 

Henry La Motte Major Williamsburg, Mass. 

James A. Massie ist Lieutenant . . . Santa Fe, N. M. 

*James R. Church ... ist Lieutenant . . .Washington, D. C. 

James B, Brady Steward Santa F6, N. M. 

Herbert J. Rankin Steward Las Vegas, N. M. 

Charles A. Wilson Steward Colorado Springs, Col. 

John R. Rawdin Private, 

* .A.cted as Regimental Surgeon during most of the campaign. 
239 



APPENDIX A 

TROOP A. 

Captain Frank Frantz. 

Frank Frantz Captain Prescott, Ariz. 

John C. Greenway ist Lieutenant Hot Springs, Ark. 

Joshua D. Carter 2d Lieutenant Prescott, Ariz. 

WiUiam W. Greenwood ist Sergeant Prescott, Ariz. 

Shot in left foot and leg in battle, July i, 1898. Engaged in battles of Las Guasimas, 
June 24th ; San Juan, July ist. 

James T. Greenley Sergeant Prescott, Ariz. 

Wounded in leg, July i, 1898. Engaged in battles of Las Guasimas, June 24th; San 
Juan, July ist; and siege of Santiago following. 

King C.Henley Q. M. Sergeant Winslow, Ariz. 

Henry W. Nash Sergeant Young, Ariz. 

Samuel H. Rhodes Sergeant Tonto Basin, Ariz. 

Robert Brown Sergeant Prescott, Ariz. 

Charles E. McGarr Sergeant Prescott, Ariz. 

Carl Holtzschue Sergeant Prescott, Ariz. 

George L. Bugbee Corporal Lordsburg, N. M. 

Harry G. White Corporal Richenbar, Ariz. 

Absent from July 2, 1898, in Governor's Island, N. Y., Hospital, on account of 

wound in leg, received on July 2, 1898. Engaged in battles of Las Guasimas, 

June 24, 1898; San Juan, July i, 1898. 

Cade C. Jackson Corporal Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Harry B. Fox Corporal Jerome, Ariz. 

William Cranfurd Corporal San Antonio, Tex. 

George A. McCarter Corporal .Safford, Ariz. 

Rufus H. Marine Corporal Flagstaff, Ariz. 

iohn D. Honey man Corporal San Antonio, Tex. 
;milio Cassi Trumpeter Jerome, Ariz. 

Wounded in hand on July 2, 1898. 

Frank Harner Trumpeter Preston, Ariz. 

Thomas Hamilton Blacksmith Jerome, Ariz. ! 

Wallace B. Willard Farrier Cottonwood, Ariz. 

Forest Whitney Saddler Richenbar, Ariz. 

John H. Waller Wagoner Prescott, Ariz. 

Wounded in left arm in battle of July i, 1898. Engaged in Las Guasimas, June 24, 
1898 ; San Juan, July i, 1898; and siege of Santiago following. 

TROOPERS. 

Adams, Ralph R., Yonkers, N. Y. Bulzing. William, Santa Fe, N. M. 

Allen, George L., Prescott, Ariz. Burke, Edward F., Orange, N. J. 

.Azbill, John, St. John's, Ariz. Hardshar, Henry P., Prescott, .^riz. 

.Azbill, William, St. John's, Ariz. Church. Leroy B. , Ithaca, Mich. 

Arnold, Henry N., New York City Curtis, Harry A., Boston, Mass. 

Barnard, John C, New York City Freeman, Thomas L., Thurber, Tex. 

Bartoo, Nelson E. , Winslow, .Ariz. Griffen, Walter W. , Globe, Ariz. 

Belknap, Prescott H. Boston, Brook- Glover, William H., Liberty. Tex. 

line, Mass. Hawes, George P., Jr., Richmond, 
Brauer, Lee W. , Richmond, Va. Va. 

Bugbee, Fred. W. , Lordsburg, N.M. Haymon, Edward G. B., Chicago, 111. 

Wounded in head in battle of San Juan, Huffman, Lawrence E. , Las Cruces, 
July I, 1898. Slight. Mauser rille. Mex. 

Bull, Charles C, San Francisco. Cal. Hoffman, Fred., Pueblo, Col. 

240 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Hodgdon, Charles E. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Hogan, Daniel L., Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Howard, John L., St. Louis. Mo. 
Hubbell, John D., Boston, Mass. 
Jackson, Charles B. , Prescott, Ariz. 

Wounded in neck at battle of San Juan, 
July I, 1898. Nature of injury slight. 
Mauser rifle. 
Johnson, John W., Kingman, Ariz. 
Letors, Jefferson D., Prescott, Ariz. 
Lewis, William F., Congress, Ariz. 
Larned, William A., Summit, N. J. 
Le Roy, Arthur M., Prescott, Ariz. 
May, James A., SafTord, Ariz. 
McCarty, Frank, Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Mills, Charles E. Cedar Rapids, la. 
Murchie, Guy, Calais, Me. 
Osborne, George, Bungendera, N. 

S. W., Australia 
O'Brien, Edward, Jerome, Ariz. 

Wounded in head, by shrapnel, morning 
of July 2, 1898. 
Page, William, Richenbar, Ariz. 
Perry, Charles B., Perry's Landing, 

Tex. 

Shot in head, July 2, 1898. Severe. 
Paxton, Frank, Safford, Ariz. 
Pearsall, Paul S., New York, N. Y. 
Pettit, Louis P., Flagstaff, Ariz. 

DISCHARGED. 

Garret, Samuel H Prescott, Ariz. 

Honorably discharged the service by order of A. G. O. Special Order No. 14, Aug. 
24, 1898. 

Greenwald, Sam Prescott, Ariz. 

Discharged by authority of Secretary of War, at Camp WikofI, Aug. 31, 1898. 

McCormick, Willis Salt Lake City, Utah. 

Honorably discharged the service, Aug. 23, 1898. By order Secretary of War. 

KILLED IN ACTION. 

O'Neill, William O Captain Prescott, Ariz. 

Engaged and killed in battle of San Juan, July i, 189S, by gunshot wound in the 
bead. 

Doherty , George H Corporal Jerome, Ariz. 

Engaged and killed in battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, i8g8, by bullet wound in 
the head. 

Boyle, James Private Prescott, Ariz. 

Engaged in and mortally wounded at battle of San Juan, July i, 1898; shot through 
n;ck and body ; died July 2, 1898. 

Ch? mplin, Fred E Private Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Engaged in batde of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898, and battle of San Juan, July i, 
1898, where he was mortally wounded. Died, July 2, 1898 ; shot in leg and foot 
by shrapnel and arm torn off by shell. Left thigh and hand. 

Lggett, Edward Private Jerome, Ariz. 

Engaged and killed in battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898; shot through the body. 

241 



Philip, Hoffman, Washington, D. C. 

Pierce, Harry B., Central City, 
N. M. 

Raudebaugh, James D., Flagstaff, 
Ariz. 

Rapp, Adolph, San Antonio, Tex. 

Sells, Henry, Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Sellers, Henry J., Williams, .A.riz. 

Sewall, Henry F., New York, N. Y. 

Shaw, James A., Prescott, Ariz. 

Shanks, Lee P., Paducah, Ky. 

Stark, Wallace J., Safford, Ariz. 

Sullivan, Patrick J., Prescott, Ariz. 

Thomas, Rufus K., Boston, Mass. 

Thomson, Joseph F., Jr., Washing- 
ton, D. C. 

Tuttle, Arthur L., Safford, Ariz. 

Van Siclen, Frank, Safford, Ariz. 

Wager, Oscar G., Jerome, Ariz. 

Wallace, Walter D., Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Wallace, William F., Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Wounded in neck in battle of San Juan, 
July I, 1898. 

Way land, Thomas J., WiUiams, 
Ariz. 

Webb, Adelbert B., Safford, Ariz. 

Weil, Henry J., Kingman, Ariz. 

Wilson, Jerome, Chloride, Ariz. 

Wrenn, Robert D., Chicago, IlL 



APPENDIX A 



Reynolds, Lewis Private Kingman, Ariz. 

Engaged in battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898, and San Juan, July i, 1898. 
Killed on July i, 1898 ; shot through the stomach. 

DIED OF DISEASE. 

Hollister, Stanley Private Santa Barbara, Cal. 

Wounded in left thigh in battle, July 2, 1898 ; severe. Died of typhoid fever in 
general U. S. Hospital, Fortress Monroe, Va., Aug. 17, 1898. 

Wallace, Alexander H Private Pasadena, Cal. 

Died of typhoid fever at St. Peter's Hospital, Brooklyn, Aug. 31, 1898. 

Walsh, George Private San Francisco, Cal. 

Died at sea, aboard S. S. Miami, Aug. 11, 1898, of chronic dysentery; buried at 
sea, Aug. 12, 1898. 

SUICIDE. 

De Vol, Harry P San Antonio, Tex. 

While in Guard-House, Camp Wikoff, died of self-inflicted wound in the head. 

DESERTER. 

Jackson, John W Private Jerome, Ariz. 

Deserted the service at Tampa, Fla., July 7, 1898. 



TROOP B. 

Captain James H. McClintock. 

James H. McClintock Captain Phoeni.>c, Ariz. 

Wounded at battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898. Wounded in left ankle. 

George B. Wilcox ist Lieutenant Prescott, Ariz. 

Thomas H. Rymning 2d Lieutenant Tucson, Ariz. 

William A. Davidson ist Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

Stephen A. Pate Q. M. Sergeant ..Tucson, Ariz. 

Wounded in right lung before Santiago de Cuba, July i, 1898. 

Elmer Hawley Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

John E. Campbell Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

Charles H. Utling Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

Edward G. Norton Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

David L. Hughes Sergeant Tucson, Ariz. 

Wounded in head, July i, 1898, at battle before Santiago de Cuba. 
Jerry F. Lee Sergeant Globe, Ariz. 

Shot in head before Santiago de Cuba, July i, 1898. 

Eugene W. Waterbury Corporal Tucson, Ariz. 

Walter T. Gregory Corporal Phoenix, Ariz. 

Thomas W. Pemberton, Jr Corporal Phoenix, .\riz. 

George J. McCabe Corporal Bisbee, Ariz. 

Calvin McCarthy Corporal Phoenix, Ariz. 

Charles E. Heitman Corporal Phoenix, Ariz. 

Frank Ward Corporal Globe, Ariz. 

Dudly S. Dean Corporal Boston, Mass. 

John Foster Bugler Bisbee, .Ariz. 

Jesse Walters Bugler Pho-nix, Ariz. 

Frank W. Harmson Farrier Tucson, Ariz. 

Fred A. Pomeroy Blacksmith Kingman, Ariz. 

Joseph E. McGinty Wagoner Tucson, Ariz. 

Richard E. Goodwin Saddler Phoenix, Ariz. 

242 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



TROOPERS. 



Boggs, Looney L., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Buckholdt, Chas. , Kickapoo Springs, 

Tex. 
Beebe, Walter S. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Brady, Fred L., New York, N. Y. 
Butler, James A. ,Albuquerque,N.M. 
Barrowe, Beekman K., Tampa, Fla. 
Colwell, Grant, Phoenix, Ariz. 
Collier, lidward G. , Globe, Ariz. 
Chester, Will M., Oakwell, Tex. 
Christian, Benjamin, Norfolk, Va. 
Chamberlin, Lowell A., Washing- 
ton, D. C. 
Day, Robert, Santa F6, N. M. 
Drachman, Sol. B. , Tucson, Ariz. 
iJraper, Durward D., Phoenix, Ariz. 
I'.akin, Alva L., Globe, Ariz, 
l-ads. Wade Q. , San Antonio, Tex. 
Fitzgerald, Frank T., Tucson, Ariz. 
Goss, Conrad F. , Tampa, Fla. 
Gurney, Frank W. , Tampa, Fla. 
Hall, John M. , Phoenix, Ariz. 
Wounded in shoulder by shrapnel, July 

I, 1898, before Santiago de Cuba. 

Piece of shell not removed. 
Hammer, John S. , San Antonio, Tex. 
Slightly wounded by shell, July i, 1898, 

before Santiago de Cuba. Wounded 

in leg. 

Hildreth, Fenn S. , Tucson, Ariz. 

Hartzell, IraC, Phcenix, Ariz. 

Haydon, Roy F., Prescott, Ariz. 

Henderson, Sibird, Globe, Ariz. 

Hildebrand, Louis T., Prescott, Ariz. 

Heywood, John P., Tampa, Fla. 

James, William T. , Jerome, Ariz. 

Johnson, Anton E. , Prescott, Ariz. 

King, Geo. C, Prescott, Ariz. 

Keir, Alex. S. , Bisbee, Ariz. 

Laird, Thomas J., Prescott, Ariz. 

Merritt, Fred M., Tucson, Ariz. 

Merritt, William W., Red Oak, la. 

McCann, W^alter J., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Iron stanchion fell upon right side of 
head, right arm and shoulder, while 
asleep in quarters on transport Yuca- 
tan, en route for Cuba, June 21, 1898. 



Middleton, Clifton C. Globe, Ariz. 
Misner, Jackson H., Bisbee, Ariz. 
McMillen, Albert C, New York, 

N. Y. 
Norton, Gould G., Tampa, Fla 
Orme, Norman L., Phoenix, Ariz. 

Shot in left arm and side, June 2.\, 189S, 
at Las Guasimas. G. S. left shoulder. 

Owens, William A., Jerome, Ariz. 
Proffitt, William B., Prescott, Ariz. 
Peck, John C. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
Pollock, Horatio C, Phoenix, Ariz. 
Patterson, Hal. A., Selma, Ala. 
Roberts, Frank S., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Rinehart, Robert, Phoenix, Ariz. 
Stanton, Richard II., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Saunders, Wellman H. , Salem, 

Mass. 
Snodderly, William L., Bisbee, Ariz. 
Smith, Race H. , San Antonio, Tex. 

Shot in stomacli, breast, and arms by 
shrapnel, July 2, 1898, before San- 
tiago. 

Schenck, Frank W., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Stewart, W. Walton, Selma, Ala. 
Toland, Jesse T., Bisbee, Ariz. 
Truman, George E., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Townsend, Albert B. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Tilkie, Charles M. , Chicago, 111. 
Van Treese, Louis H., Tucson, Ariz. 
Warford, David E., Globe, Ariz. 

Shot in both thighs, July i, 1898, before 
Santiago de Cuba. 

Webb, William W. , Prescott. Ariz. 
Wiggins, Thomas W. , Bisbee, Ariz. 
Shot in right hip at Las Guasimas, June 
24, 1S98. G. S. left hip. 

Whittaker, George C, Silver City, 

N. M. 
Wilkerson, Wallace W. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Woodward, Sidney H., Kingman, 

Ariz. 
Young, Thomas H., Phoenix, Ariz. 



D/SCI/ARG£D. 

Bird, Marshall M California. 

Discharged on Surgeon's certificate of disability. Fracture of skull and concussion 
of brain incurred m line of duty, Aug. 8, 1898. 
Cronin, Cornelius P Yuma, Ariz. 

Discharged, June 13, 1898, on Surgeon's certificate. 

243 



APPENDIX A 



Crimmins, Martin L New York, N. Y. 

Mustered out to accept commission, July 29, 1S98. 
Goodrich, David M Akron, O. 

Discharged, May 19, 1898, to accept commission. 
Murphy, James E Delrio. Ariz. 

Discharged, Sept. loth, by order of Secretary of War. Shot in head, July i, 1898, 
before Santiago de Cuba. 

DIED. 

Hall, Joel R Corporal Seattle, Wash. 

Killed, July i, 1898, before Santiago de Cuba; buried on field of battle. 
Logue, David Globe, Ariz. 

Killed, July i, 1898, before Santiago de Cuba; buried on field of battle. 
Norton, Oliver B 

Killed, July i, 1898, before Santiago de Cuba : buried on field of battle. 
Saunders, W. H Salem, Mass. 

Died of fever at Santiago. 
Smith, Race W San Antonio, Tex. 

Died of wounds received July 2, 1898. 
Swetman, John W Globe, Ariz. 

Killed, July i, 1898, before Santiago de Cuba; buried on field of battle. 
Tomlinson, Leroy E 

Sent to hospital boat, June 19, 1898, en route to Cuba; fever. Certificate of death 
dated June 23, 1898. Body and effects sent ashore, care Capt. Stephens, Signal 
Corps, U. S. A. Typhoid fever contracted in line of duty. 



TROOP C. 



Captain Joseph L. B. Alexander. 

Joseph L. B. Alexander Captain Phoenix, Ariz. 

Robert S. Patterson ist Lieutenant . .Safford, Ariz. 

Hal Sayre, Jr 2d Lieutenant. . .Denver, CoL 

Willis O. Huson ist Sergeant Yuma, Ariz. 

James H. Maxey Q. M. Sergeant. Yuma, Ariz. 

Sam W. Noyes Sergeant Tucson, Ariz. 

Adam H. Klingham Sergeant Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Sunmer H. Geiurd Sergeant New York, N. Y. 

John McAndrew Sergeant Congress Junction, Ariz. 

Eldridge E. Jordan Sergeant Phoeni.x, Ariz. 

Wilbur D. French Corporal Safford, Ariz. 

Hedrick M. Warren Corporal Phoenix, Ariz. 

Bruce C. Weathers Corporal Safford, Ariz. 

Frank A. Woodin Corporal Phoenix, Ariz. 

Charles A. Armstrong Corporal San Jose, Cal. 

Elisha E. Garrison Corporal New York, N. Y. 

William T. Atkins Corporal Selma, Ala. 

Oscar J. Mullen Corporal Tempe, Ariz. 

Frank Marti Trumpeter Jerome, Ariz. 

John A. W. Stelzriede Trumpeter Tempe, Ariz. 

James G. Yost Blacksmith Prescott, Ariz. 

Frank Vans Agncw Farrier Kissimee, Fla. 

Francis L. Morgan Saddler White Hills, Ariz. 

J erome W. Lankford Wagoner White Hills, Ariz, 

244 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



TROOPERS. 



Asay, William, Safford, Ariz. 
Anderson, Thomas A., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Bartliell, Peter K. , Kingman, Ariz. 
Bradley, Peter, Jerome, Ariz. 
Burks, Robert E. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Byrns, Orlando C. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Bowler, George P., New York, N. Y. 
Carleton, William C. , Tempe, Ariz. 
Carlson, Carl, Tempe, Ariz. 
Cartledge, Crantz, Tempe, Ariz. 
Coleman, Lockhart G., St. Louis, Mo. 
Danforth, Clyde L., Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Danforth, Wm. H., Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Dewees, John L. , San Antonio, Tex. 
Duncan, Arthur G. , New York. 
Engel, I'^dwin P., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Force, Peter, Selma, Ala. 
Gaughan, James, Phoenix, Ariz. 
Gibbins, Floyd J., Prescott, Ariz. 
Goodwin, James C., Tempe, Ariz. 
Gardiner, John P., Boston, Mass. 
Gavin, Anthony, Buffalo, N. Y. 
Hanson, Ivan M., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Hanson, William, Prescott, Ariz. 
Herokl, Philip M., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Howland, Harry, Flagstaff. Ariz. 
Hubbell, William C, .Noi'.ales, Ariz. 
Hall, Edward C, New Haven, Conn. 
Kastens, Harry E., Winslow, Ariz. 



Marvin, William E., Yuma, Ariz. 
Mason, David P., Brownsville, Tex. 
Moffett, Edward B. , Yuma, Ariz. 
Neville, George A., Yuma, Ariz. 
Norton, John W., Lockport, 111. 
O'Leary, Daniel, Tempe, Ariz. 
Parker, John W., Safford, Ariz. 
Payne, Forest B. , Phoenix, Ariz. 
Pond, Ashley, Detroit, Mich. 
Perry, Arthur R. ,Phuenix, Auz. 
Ricketts, William L. , Phoenix, Ariz. 
Roedercr, John, Prescott, Ariz. 
Rupert, Charles W. , Prescott, Ariz. 
Reed, George W. , Tucson, Ariz. 
Sayers, Samuel E. , Yuma, Ariz. 
Scharf, Charles A. , Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Sexsmith, William, Yuma, Ariz. 
Shackelford, Marcus L., Jerome, 

Ariz. 
Shoemaker, John, Phoenix, Ariz. 
Skogsburg, Charles G. , Safford, Ariz. 
Scull, Guy H., Boston, Mass. 
Sloan, Thomas H., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Somers, Fred B., Flagstaff, Ariz. 
Trowbridge, Lafayette, Prescott, 

Ariz. 
Vines, Jesse G. , Phoenix, Ariz. 
Vance, William E. , Austin, Tex. 
Wormell, John A., Phoenix, Ariz. 
Younger, Charles, Winslow, Ariz. 



Wright, Albert P Color Sergeant * Yuma, Ariz. 



DISCHARGED— Disability. 

Alamia, John B Private Port Isabel, Tex, 

iJischarged, account epileptic fits, per order O. A. G. O. 
Pearson, Rufus W Sergeant Phoenix, Ariz. 

Dischartved, Aug. 26, 1898, on certificate of discharge signed by Secretary of War 
General Alger. 

DISCHARGED BY ORDER. 

Grindell, Thomas F Sergeant Tempe, Ariz. 

Discharged by telegraph order A. G. O., Sept. 8, 1898. 
Hill, Wesley Private Tempe, Ariz. 

Discharged by telegraph order A. G. O., Sept. 8, 1898. 

Scudder, William M Private Chicago, 111. 

Discharged per special order 204, par. 52, War Department, A. G. O., Washing- 
ton, D. C, Aug. 30, 1898. 

Wallack, Robt. R Private Washington. 

Discharged, July 10, i8g3, per par. 27, S. O. 203, War Department, A. G. O., 
Washington, D, C,, Aug. 29, 1898, being appointed 2d Lieutenant for Regular 
Army. 

* Color Sergeant of Regiment. 

245 



APPENDIX A 



TRA NSFERRED. 

Rowdin, John E Private Phcenix, Ariz. 

1 ranslerred, June 8, 1898, per K. O. No. 6, dated Tampa, Fla., June 8, 1898. 

DIED. 

Adsit, NathanielB Private Buffalo, N. Y. 

Died, Aug. ist, at Buffalo, of typhoid fever. 
Clearwater, Frank H Private Brownsville, Tex. 

Died at Corpus Christi, Sept. 2, 1898, of typhoid malaria. 
Newnhone, Thomas M Private Phoenix, Ariz. 

Died at hospital Fort McPherson, of typhoid fever, Aug. 4, iSyS. 



TROOP D, 
Captain R. B. Huston. 

Robert B. Huston Captain Guthrie, O. T. 

David M. Goodrich ist Lieutenant Akron, Ohio. 

Robert H. M. Ferguson 2d Lieutenant New York City. 

Orlando G. Palmer ist Sergeant Ponco City, O. T. 

Gerald A. Webb Sergeant Guthrie, O. T. 

Joseph A. Randolph Sergeant Waukomis, O. T. 

Ira A. Hill Sergeant Newkirk, O. T. 

Charles E. Hunter Sergeant Enid, O. T. 

Scott Reay Sergeant Blackwell, O. T. 

Paul W. Hunter Sergeant Chandler, O. T. 

Thomas Moran Sergeant Fort Sill, O. T. 

Calvin Hill Corporal Pawnee, O. T. 

George Norris Corporal Kingfisher, O. T. 

John D. Roades Corporal Hennessey, O. T. 

Wounded in battle of Las Guasiraas, June 24, 1898. G. S. leg. 

Lyman F. Beard Corporal Shawnee, O. T. 

Henry Meagher Corporal El Reno, O. T. 

Wounded in the battle before .Santiago, July i, 1S98. Both shoulders. 
Alexander H. Denham Corporal .Oklahonia City, O. T. 

Wounded in battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898. G. S. left thigh. 

Henry K. Love Corporal Tecumseh, O. T. 

Harrison J. Holt Corporal Denver, Col. 

Wilham D. Amrine Saddler Newkirk, O. T. 

Starr W. Wetmore Trumpeter Newkirk, O. T. 

Wounded in battle before Santiago, July i, 1898. Right thigh, severe. Missile 
or weapon, Mauser rifle. 

James T. Brown Trumpeter Newkirk, O. T. 

Lorrin D. Mu.\low Wagoner Guthrie, O. T. 

TROOPERS. 

Baily, William, Norman, O. T. Burgess, George, Shawnee, O. T. 

Wounded in battle before Santiago, Brandon, Perry H. , Lancaster, O.T. 

July 2, 1898. Right foot. Missile Byrne, Peter F. , Guthrie, O. T. 

or weapon, Mauser rifle. Cease, Forrest L., Guthrie, O. T. 

Beal. Fred N. , Kingfisher, O. T. Chase, Leslie C , Kingfisher, O. T. 

Wounded in battle of Las Guasimas, ^ook Walter M., Enid, O. T^ 

June 24, 1898. G. S. leg. Crawford. William S. , Enid, O. T. 

246 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Cross, William E., El Reno, O. T. 
Crockett, Warren E., Marietta, Ga. 
Wounded in battle before Santiago, 

July 2, 1898. Leg. Missile or weapon, 

Mauser rifle. 
Cunningham, Solomon M., San An- 
tonio, Tex. 
Carlow, Gerald, Boerne, Tex. 
David, Icem J., Enid, O. T. 
Emery, Elzie E. , Shawnee, O. T. 
Faulk, William A., Guthrie, O. T. 
Hill, Edwin M., Tecumseh, O. T. 
Honeycutt, James V., Shawnee, O. 

Eppley, Kurtz, Orange, N. J. 
Green, Charles H., Albuquerque, 

N. M. 
Hatch, Charles P. , Newport. R. I. 
Holmes, Thomas M. , Newkirk, O. T. 
Wounded in battle before Santiago, 
July I, 1898. Left leg, severe. 
Missile or weapon, Mauser rifle. 

Haynes, Jacob M., Newkirk, O. T. 
Howard, John S., Boerne, Tex. 
Ishler, Shelby F., Enid, O. T. 

Wounded in battle of Las Guasimas, 
June 24, 1898. G. S. right forearm. 

Ivy, Charles B. , Waco, Tex. 
Johnston, Edward W., Gushing, O. 

T. 

Wounded in battle before Santiago, 
July I, 1898. Right thigh. 

ioyce, Walter, Guthrie, O. T. 
Lnox, William F. 
Laird, Emmett, .'\lbuquerque, N. 

M. 
Loughmiller, Edgar F. , Oklahoma 

City, O. T. 
Lovelace. Carl, Waco, Tex. 
Lush, Henry. El Reno, O. T. 



McMillan, Robert L. , Shawnee, O. 

T. 

Wounded in battle before Santiago, 
July I, 1898. Left shoulder and 
arm. 
McClure, David V., Oklahoma City, 

O. T. 
McMurtry, George G., Pittsburg, 

Pa. 
Miller, Roscoe B., Guthrie, O. T. 
Miller, Volney D., Guthrie. O. T. 
Munn, Edward, Elizabeth, N. J. 
Newcomb, Marcellus L., Kingfisher, 

O. T. 

Wounded in battle of Las Guasimas, 
June 24, 1898. G. S. right knee. 

Norris, Warren, Kingfisher, O. T. 
Palmer, William F., Shawnee, O. T. 
Proctor, Joseph H., Pawnee. O. T. 
Pollock, William, Pawnee, O. T. 
Russell, Albert P., El Reno, O. T. 
Sands, George H., Guthrie, O. T. 
Schmutz, John C. , Germantown, 

Ohio. 
Scott, Cliff D., Clifton, O. T. 
Schupp, Eugene, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Shanafelt. Dick, Perry, O. T. 
Shipp, Edward M., Kingfisher, O. T. 
Stewart, Clare H., Pawnee, O. T. 
Stewart, Clyde H., Pawnee, O. T. 
Tauer, William L., Ponca City, O. 

T. 
Thomas, Albert M., Guthrie, O. T. 
Vanderslice, James li. , Enid, O. T. 
Van Valen, Alexander L., Pough- 

keepsie, N. Y. 
Wolff, Frederick W., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Wright, William O., Pawnee, O. T. 
Wright, Edward L., Guthrie, O. T. 



DISCHARGED. 

Shockey , James M Corporal Perry, O. T. 

Discharged, July i, 1S98, by order of Asst. Adjt. Gen'l. 
Luther, Arthur A Farrier Pawnee, O. T. 

Discharged, July i, 1898, by order of Asst. Adjt. Gen'l. 
Page, John F Private Alva, O. T. 

Discharged by verbal order of Gen'l Wood, Aug. 6, 1898. 
Wells, Joseph O Private St. Joseph, Mich. 

Discharged by order of Asst. Adjt. Gen'l, Aug. 27, 1898. 
Simpson, William S Corporal Dallas, Tex. 

Discharged by reason of promotion into regular army, as 2d Lieut., Sept. 3, iJ 



247 



APPENDIX A 



TRANSFERRED. 

Schuyler, A. McGinnis ist Lieutenant Ncwkirk, O. T. 

Promoted to Captain and transferred to Troop I ist U. S. V. C, May 19, 1898. 

Schweizer, Jacob 2d Lieutenant El Reno, O. T. 

Promoted to 1st Lieut, and assigned to duty as Q. M. ist U. S. V. C, May 19, 
1898. 

Carr, Joseph A ist Lieutenant Washington, D. C. 

Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C, Sept. 5, 1898. Wounded in battle before 
Santiago, July 2, 189S. Left testicle. Missile or weapon, Mauser riiie. 

PRIVATES. 

Douthett, Matthew, Guthrie, O. T. Mitchell, William H., Guthrie, O. 

Appointed Q. M. Sergeant ist U. S. V. T. 

C, and assigned to duty, Aug. 31, Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C, 

1S98. May II, 1898. 

Freeman, Elisha L., Ponca City, O., Staley, Francis M., Waukomis, O. 

T. T. 

Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C., Transferred to Troop K 1st U. S. V. 

May II, 1898. C, May 11, 1898. 

Folk, Theodore, Oklahoma City, Smith, Fred, Guthrie, O. T. 

jo[ yi transferred to 1 roop K ist U. S. V, 

Trknsferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C, C-' ^^^^ ' '' '^98- 

May II, 1898. Weitzel, John F. , Newkirk, O. T. 

TTi r.i_i.»T^iT-. /-.T^ Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. 

Hulme. Robert A., El Reno, OT C, May n, 1898. 

Transferred to 1 roop K. 1st U. S. V. C, iir , j t u a 1-1 n /-v t- 

May II, 1898. Woodward, John A., El Reno, O. T. 

' », TTI D /-> Transferred to troop K ist U. S. V. 

Jordan, Andrew M., El Reno, O. c.. May n, 1898. 

— ' , j.T L' ►TTc^rr- Wilson, Frank M., Guthrie, O. T. 

Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C, Transferred to Tr^op K ist U. S. V. 

Mayii, 1S98. C, May.,, i8q8. 

McGinty. William, Stillwater. O. T. Burke, Edward F., Orange, N. J. 

Transferred to Troop K ist U. S. V. C, Transferred to Troop A ist U. S. V. 

May II, 1898. C, July 13, 1898. 

DIED. 

Cashion, Roy V Private Hennessey, O. T. 

Killed in battle before Santiago, July 1, 1S98. Head. 
Miller, Theodore W Private Akron, Ohio. 

Wounded in battle before Santiago, July i, 1898. Died fnjm efTects of wound, July 
8,1898. Penetrating neck ; severe — totally paralyzed from head down. 

DESERTED. 

Crosley , Henry S Private Guthrie, O. T. 

Dropped from the rolls as deserted, July 8, 1S98. 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

TROOP E. 

Captain Frederick Muller. 

Frederick Muller Captain Santa Fe, N. M. 

William E. Griffin ist Lieutenant Santa Fe, N. M. 

John A. Mcllhenny 2d Lieutenant New Orleans, La. 

John S. Lanj,'.ston ist Sergeant Cerrillos. N. M. 

Royal A. Prentice Q. M. Sergeant. . . Las Vegas, N. M. 

Hugh B. Wright Sergeant Las Vegas, N. M. 

Albert M. Jones Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Timothy Breen Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded and sent to hospital, July i, 1898. Arm. 

Berry F. Taylor Sergeant Las Vegas, N. M. 

Thomas P. Ledgwidge Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

John Mullen Sergeant Chicago, 111. 

Wounded and sent to hospital, July i, 1898. Side and head; severe. 

Harman H. Wynkoop Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded in line ot duty and sent to hospital, July 2, 1898. Returned to duty, 
Sept. 4, 1898. 

James M. Dean Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded in line of duty and sent to hospital, June 24, 1898. Returned to duty, 
Aug. 31, 189S. G. S left thigh. 

Edward C. Waller Corporal.. Chicago, 111. 

Wounded in line of duty, July 2, 1898. Scalp, slight. 

G. Roland Fortescue Corporal New York, N. Y. 

Slight bullet wound in foot, July i, 1898. 

Edward Bennett Corporal Cripple Creek, Col. 

Charles E. Knoblauch Corporal New York, N. Y. 

Richard C. Conner Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Ralph E. McFie Corporal Las Cruces, N. M. 

Arthur J. Griffin Trumpeter Santa Fe, N. M. 

Edward S. Lewis Trumpeter Las Vegas, N. M. 

Robert J. Parrish Blacksmith Clayton, N. M. 

Grant Hill Farrier Santa Fe, N. M. 

Joe T. Sandoval Saddler Santa Fe, N. M. 

Guilford B. Chapin Wagoner Santa Fe, N. M. 



TROOPERS. 

Ausburn, Charles G., New Orleans, Dettamore, George W. , Clayton, 

La. N. M. 

Almack, Roll, Santa Fe, N. M. Wounded in line of duty and sent to 

Brennan, John M., Santa Fe, N. M. hospital, July i, 1898. 

Baca, Jose M., Las Vegas, N. M. Davis, Harry A., Boston, Mass. 

Beard, William M., San Antonio, Dodge, George H., Denver, Col. 

Tex. Debli, Joseph, Tampa, Fla. 

Cooper, George B, Tampa, Fla. Donavan, Freeman M., Santa Fe, 

Conway, James, San Antonio, Tex. N. M. 

249 



APPENDIX A 



Douglas, Tames B. , New York, N. Y. 
Easley, William T., Clayton, N. M. 
Edwards, Lawrence \V. 
Fries, Frank D., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Francis, Mack, Maynesville, N. C. 
Fettes, George, Antonito, Col. 
Gisler, Joseph, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Gibbs, James P., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Gibbie, William R. , Las Vegas, 

N. M. 
Grigsby, Braxton, New York, N. Y. 
Grigg, John G. , San Antonio, Tex. 
Gammel, Roy U., Jersey Co., 111. 
Harding, John D., Socoro, N. M. 
Hood, John B., New York, N. Y. 
Harkness, Daniel D. , Las Vegas, 

N. M. 
Hutchison, William M. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Hall, John P., Williamson Co. , Te.x. 

Wounded in line of duty and sent to 
hospital, July i, 1S9S. Returned to 
duty, Aug. 31, 1898. 
Hogle, William H., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Hudson, Arthur J., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Hulskotter, John, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Hutchason, Joseph M., Jimtown, 

Tenn. 
Howell. William S. E., Cerrillos, 

N. M. 
Hadden, David A., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Hixon, Thomas L. , Las Vegas, N. M. 
Heard, Judson, Pecos City, Tex. 
Hamlin, Warden W. , Chicago, 111. 
Jones, Thomas B., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Johnston, Charles E., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Jacobus, Charles W. , Santa F^, 

N. M. 
Knapp, Edgar A., Elizabeth, N. J. 
Kingsley, Charles E. , Las Vegas, 

N. M. 
Kissam, William A., New York, 

N. Y. 
Lowe, Frank, Santa Fe, N. M. 



Ludy, Dan, Las Vegas, N. M. 
Livingston, Thomas C, Hamilton 

Co. , Tex. 
Lowitzki, Hyman S. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Lewis, James. 

Merchant, James E. , Cerrillos, N. M. 
Moran, William J., Cerrillos, N. M. 
McKinnon, Samuel, Madrid, N. M. 
McKinley, Charles E. , Cerrillos, 

N. M. 

Wounded in line of duty, July i, 1898. 
Head. 
McKay, Charles F. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
McCabe, Frederick H. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
McDowell, John C, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Morrison, Amaziah B. , Las Vegas, 

N. M. 
Mahan, Lloyd L. , Cerrillos, N, M. 
Martin, Henry D., Cerrillos, N. M. 
Menger, Otto F. , Clayton, N. M. 

Wounded in line of duty, July i, 1898. 
Sent to hospital. Left side. 
Mungor, William C. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Nettleblade, Adolph F., Cerrillos, 

N. M. 
Roberts, Thomas, Golden, N. M. 
Ryan, John E., Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded, July i, i8g8, in line of duty. 
Ramsey, Homer M., Pearsall, Tex. 
Seaders, Ben. F. , Las Vegas, N. M. 
Skinner, Arthur V., Santa F(J,N. M. 
Schnepple, William C. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Scanlon, Edward, Cerrillos, N. M. 
Slevin, Edward, Tampa, Fla, 
Taylor, William R., New York, N. 

Y. 
Wagner, William W., Bland, N. M. 
Wright, George, Madrid, N. M. 
Wynkoop, Charles W., Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Warren, George W., Santa Fe, 

N. M. 



DISCHARGED. 



Dame, William E 1st Sergeant . . 

Discharged per O. reg. comds., Aug. 10, 1898. 
Wesley, Frederick C Sergeant 

Discharged on account of disability, Aug. 26, 
July I, 2, or 3. 



.Cerrillos, N. M. 



..Santa Fe, N. M. 
Wounded forearm, slight, 



250 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



TRANSFERRED BV VERBAL ORDER REGIMENTAL COM- 
MANDER, May 12, iSg8. 



Reber, William R Sergeant . 

Price, Stuart R Corporal 

Bernard, William C Trooper. . 

Brown, Hiram T Trooper. . 

Bump, Arthur L Trooper. . 

Cloud, William Trooper. . 

Davis, Henry Clay Trooper. . 

Duran, Jose L Trooper. . 

Easton, Stephen Trooper. . 

Fennell, William A Trooper. . 

Fleming, Clarence A Trooper. . 

Holdcn, Prince A Trooper. . 

Land, Oscar N Trooper. . 

Martin, John Trooper. . 

Roberts, John P Trooper.. 

Stephens, Orregon Trooper.. 

Torbett, John G Trooper. . 

Williams, Thomas C Trooper. . 

Zigler, Daniel j Trooper. . 



DIED. 

Cochran, Irad, Jr '. . . .Trooper 

Died, May 26, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. Spinal meningitis. 
Miller, John S Trooper 

Died, July 16, 1898, of yellow fever, at Siboney, Cuba. 
Judson, Alfred M Trooper 

Died Aug. 17, 1898, of typhoid fever, at Montauk Point, L. I. 
O'Neill, John Trooper 

Died, Aug. 3, 1898, of dysentery, at Edgmont Key, Fla. 



KILLED. 



Green, Henry C Trooper 

KiUed in action, July i, 1898, near Santiago de Cuba. 
Robinson, John F Trooper 

Killed in action, July 2, 1898, near Santiago de Cuba. 

ALTERATIONS, September T, iSqS. 

Sherrard, Coleman ist Lieutenant Santa Fe, N. M. 

John A. Mcllhenny 2d Lieutenant, . . .New Orleans, La. 



251 



APPENDIX A 

TROOP F. 
Captain Maximilian Luna. 

Maximilian Luna Captain Santa Fe, N. M. 

Horace W. Weakley ist Lieutenant Santa Fe, N. M, 

William E. Dame 2d Lieutenant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Transferred from Troop E to F. 

Horace E. Sherman ist Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Garfield Hughes Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Thomas D. Fennessy Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wilham L. Mattocks Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

James Doyle Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

George W. Armijo Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded in action, June 24th. G. S. wrist. 

Eugene Bohlinger Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Herbert A. King Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Edward Donnelly Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

John Cullen Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Edward Hale Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Arthur P. Spenser Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

John Boehnke Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Albert Powers Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded in action, July i, 1898. 

Wentworth S. Conduit Corporal Santa Fe, N. M. 

Ray V. Clark Farrier Santa Fe, N. M. 

Contusion scalp, slight. Missile shrapnel. Wounded near Santiago de Cuba, July 
I, 2, or 3, 1898. 

Charles R. Gee Farrier Santa Fe, N. M. 

Jefferson Hill Wagoner Santa Fe, N. M. 

J. Kirk McKurdy Trumpeter San Antonio, Tex. 

Arthur L. Perry Bugler Santa Fe, N. M. 

Shoulder. Mauserrifle. Wounded near Santiago de Cuba, July i, 2, or 3, 1S98. 

PRIVATES. 

Albers, H. L.. Santa Fe, N. M. Bell, Wm. A., Tampa, Fla. 

Wounded in action, June 24, 1898. G. Brennan, Jeremiah, Santa Fe, N. M. 

S. right wrist. Burris, Walter C. , Santa Fe, N. M. 

Albertson, Ed. J.. Santa Fe, N. M. Byrne, John Muscogee, I. T. 

Wounded in action, June 24. G. S. 1 ransferred f rom I roop L to F. 

wrist. Bell, John H., Santa Fe, N. M. 

Alexander James, Santa Fe, N. M. Cochran, William O., Santa Fe, N. 

Abbott. Chas. G.. Santa Fe, N. M. M. 

Adams, Edgar S., San Antonio, Clark, Frank J., San Antonio, Tex. 

Tex. Colbert, Benjamin H., San Antonio, 

Alexander, James F. , Santa Fe, N. Tex. 

M. Christian, Edward D., Tampa, Fla. 

Black, James S. , Santa Fe, N. M. Clelland, Calvin G., Santa Fe, N. M. 

Bailey, Rob't Z., Santa Fe, N. M. Conley, Edward C, Santa Fe, N. 

Wounded in action, June 24lh. G. S. M. 

both legs. Cochran, Willard M., Santa Fe, N. 

Boschen, John, San Antonio, Tex. M. 

252 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Cherry, Charles C, Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Dougherty, Louis, Santa F^, N. M. 
De Bohun, John C, Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Farley, William, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Freeman, Will, Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded by fragments of shell in wrist, 
July I, 1898. Left wrist. 
Gibbs, Henry M., Santa Fe, N. M. 

Gunshot wound in foot, July i, i8g8. 
Gallagher, Wm. D., Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Goldberg, Samuel, Santa Fe, N. M. 

Wounded in action, July i, i8g8. Hip. 
Mauser ride. 
Glessner, Otis, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Green, John D. . Santa Fe, N. M. 
Hartle, Albert C, Santa Fe, N. M. 

Gunshot wound in testicles, June 24, 
1898. 
Hopping, Charles O. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Hammer, George, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Kennedy, Stephan A., Santa Fe, N-. 

M. 
Leffert. Charles E., Santa Fe. N. M. 
Lisk, Guy M., Santa F^, N. M. 
Leach, John M. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
Le Stourgeon, E. Guy, San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Lavelle, Nolan Z. , San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Martin, Thomas, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Mills, John B. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
McGregor, Herbert P., Santa Fe, 

N. M. 

Wounded in action, July i, 1898. Left 
shoulder. Mauser rifle. 
McCurdy, F. Allen, San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Nickell, William E., Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Nesbit, Otto W., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Newitt, George W. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Neal, John M., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Parmele, Charles A., Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Quier, Frank T. , Santa Fe, N. M. 



Raymond, Milliard L. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Reed, Harry B., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Reed, Clifford L., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Wounded in action, June 24, i8g8. In 
arm. 
Renner, Charles L. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Reynolds, Edwin L. , Santa F^, N. 

M. 
Russell, Arthur L., Santa F6, N. M. 
Rebentisch, Adolph, San Antonio, 

Tex. 

Gunshot wound in shoulder, June 24, 
1898. Left shoulder. 
Reyer, Adolph T. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
Rogers, Albert, Santa F^, N. M. 
Rice, Lee C, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Staub, Louis E. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
Shields, William G., Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Stockbridge, Arthur H. , Santa Fe, 

N. M. 
Sharland, George H., Santa F^, N. 

M. 
Skipwith, John G. , Santa Fe, N. M. 
Sinnett, James B., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Tangen, Edward, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Trump, Norman O. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Vinnedge, George E., Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
^\'^ard\vell, Louis C. , Santa F^, N. 

M. 
Warren, Paul, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Watrous, Charles E. , Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Weber, Beauregard, Santa Fe, N. 

M. 
Weller, Samuel M., San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Winter. John G. , San Antonio, Tex. 

Gunshot wounds in shoulder, arm and 
leg, July I, 1S93. 

Winter, Otto R. , San Antonio, Tex. 
Wertheim, Adolph S. , San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Walsh, John, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Wells, Thomas J., Santa Fe, N. M. 
W^ilson, Harry W., Tampa, Fla. 



DISCHARGED. 



Douglass, James Private Santa Fe', N. M. 

Discharged acct. Surgeon's certificate of disability. 

253 



APPENDIX A 



TRANSFERRED. 

Keyes, Maxwell 2d Lieutenant. . 

Promoted to Adjutant, August i, 18 



. Santa Fe, N. M. 



PRIVATES. 



Flynn, Joseph P., Santa F^, N. M. 
Transterred from Troop F to I, May, 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 
Goodrich, Hedrick Ben, Santa Fe, 
N. M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, i8q8, San Antonio, Tex. 
Hickey, Walter, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, iSoS, San Antonio, Tex. 
Hogan, Michael, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, i8g8, San Antonio, Tex. 
King, Harry Bruce, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898. San Antonio, Tex. 
Kerney, George M., Santa Fe, N. 
M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 189S, San Antonio, Tex. 
Larsen, Louis, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
j2, 1S93, San Antonio, Tex. 
McCoy, John, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 



Nehmer, Charles A., Santa Fe, N. 
M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 
Rogers, Leo G., N. M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1S9S, San Antonio, Tex. 
Rafalowitz, Hyman, Santa Fe, N. 
M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 
Spencer, Edwards John, Santa Fe, 
N. M. 

TransfeiTed from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 
Schearnhorst, Jr., Carl J., Santa Fe, 
N. M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 

Temple, Frank, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, San Antonio, Tex. 

Bawcom, Joseph L., Santa Fe, N. 
M. 

Transferred from Troop F to I, May 
12, 1898, at San Antonio, Tex. 



DIED. 

Booth, Frank B Private Madison, Wis. 

Wounded in action at Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898; died at Key West. August 30, 
1898. G. S. ri.crht shoulder. 
Erwin, Wilham T Private Austin, Tex. 

Killed in action, June 24, 1898, Las Guasimas. G. S. head. 
Endsley, Guy D Private Somerfield, Pa. 

Died in Cuba, July 18, i8g8, of fever. 

DESERTED. 

Thompson, Charles Private Mercer Co., W. Va. 

Deserted at Tampa, Fla., July 27, 1898. 

DISCH.-IRGED. 

Mcllhenny, John A Corporal. San Antonio, Tex. 

Discharged to accept commission. 



254 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

TROOP G. 

Captain William H. H. Llewellen. 

Sfwes'Je/'dreir"'^" ^^P/^'" Las Cruces, N. M. 

bavid J Leahy oH n '"/'"^"' • " " P''^""?' '^- ^■ 

Raymond Morse.-.;;-. L^e.nr'''"' -^^""P' ^- ^• 

RoIlaA. Fullenweider..:::; Serfean P.. ^r ^. 

Matthew T. McGehee. . Serlean l.\ ' m 11' 

James Brown ^fr^o ! S^.'P"' ^- ^• 

I^icholasA.V-y-ne:::::::: Sefea" Gallup, N.M. 

Raleigh L. Miller Serf earn p"'??'-'^^^"- 

Henry Kirah ^ergeant Pueblo, Col. 

James' aRuc-h-ie;;::::;;; gS" r''^>^\¥- 

Luther L. Stewart r^r^ Gallup, N. M. 

Wounded in battle ■iuA;-a-;th "Abs-e^^MnTe n V^^'°"' ^- ^^- 

T u >, c^ .j""c^4"i- •^Dsent Mnce on account of wound. G *< left frvr^or™ 
John McSparron Corooral n ii x "w ^°'^^^'™- 

''^:X^-^ — -cVon?3^1,--„i:^S'4h^evere. Mls- 

I^:iJSft:m;irong:;;:;; g°;i^°-l S^--- n. m. 

William S. Reid. . . . _ Cornora p'^.^'^"!'.^"^' ^^ ^• 

Hiram E. Williams.. Comora p T"' x/ ^Z 

George V. Haeiner .... F?r^er r T"' ^f ¥; 

Frank A. Hill sSJr' Gallup N. M. 

Thomas O'Neal Wnf ^^'°"' ^- ^■ 

Willis E. Some s >^ agoner Springer, N. M. 

Edward G Piper rrumpeter Raton, N. M. 

AlvinCAsh.^ Trumpeter Silver City, N. M. 

Absence from comm^^d si-n'c^'jul-y- "ist To Sent' Vrh " ' " " ^^^°"' N- M. 

battle. Wrist, slight. Missile, shrlpnd. ^ ^ °" ^"°""' of wound received in 

TROOPERS. 
Arnold, Edward R. Prescoft AnV t3„- it, -r „ 

Akin, James E., Dolores Col cT'^^'A''^'} 4' ^^^""P' N. M. 

Anderson, Arthur T Albuaueraue n P' ?,^°'^' ^^'°"' ^"^^ ^■ 
NM ^""r 1., AiDuquerque, Camp, Marion, Raton, N. M 

Andrew's, William C, Sulphur ^"^^"^"S^, Thomas F., Raton, N. 
Springs, Tex. ^ it ■ r 

B,u„,e,, J., Wi„i.„ H., Dolores, ^iZ'.^.f'T.I-^v':, '-B°u°if;,"°N 

Brown, Robert, Gallup, N. M r- ^i ,,. , 

Brown. Edwin M.. San Antonio Te.v ^°y'e, Michael H., Raton, N. M. 
Brazelton, William H., St. Louis." -Absent on sick leave since June 24th 

Mo. ^ ""ji-^countof wound in arm received 

m battle. 

255 



APPENDIX A 



Clark, Winslow, Milton, Mass. 
Absent on sick leave since July ist on 
account of gunshot wound through 
lung received in battle. Right lung, 
severe. Missile or vfeapon, Mauser 
rifle. 
Cotton, Frank W., Jennings, La. 
Conover, Alfred J., Chicasee, I. T. 
Detwiler, Sherman, Muscatine, la. 
Dunn, Alfred B., Calvert, Tex. 
Edmunds, John H., Alleghany, Pa. 
Faupel, Henry F., Martington, 111. 
Fornoff, Frederick, Albuquerque, 

N. M. 
Fitch, Roger S., Buffalo, N. Y. 
Gibson, William C, Gallup, N. M. 
Gevers, Louis, Austin, Tex. 
Absent from July ist till Aug. 2d on 
account of gunshot wound in hips 
received in battle. 
Goodwin, John, Gallup, N. M. 
Healey, Frank F., Brooklyn, N. Y. 
Henderson, John, Gallup, N. M. 
Absent from July ist to Sept. 2d on 
account of wound in arm received in 
battle. Wrist. Missile or weapon, 
Mauser rifle. 
Henshaw, Laten R., El Paso, Tex. 
Johnson, Albert John, Raton, N. M. 
Kline, John S., San Marcial, N. M. 
Keeley, Bert T., Lamy, N. M. 
King, Henry A., Massitee, Mich. 
Littleton, Elias M., Springer, N. M. 
Lincoln, Malcom D., Lucknow, I. T. 
Larson, Anton, Silvcrton, Col. 
Lyle, James C, Georgetown, Col. 
Miller, Frank P., Los .Angeles, Cal. 
Meyers, Fred P., Gallup, N. M. 
Reduced from ist Sergt. to Trooper on 
account of absence caused by wound 
received in battle, July i, 1898. 
Head, severe. 
Moran, Daniel, Gallup, N. M. 
Mann, Eugene M. , Omaha, Neb. 



McCarthy, George H., Los Angeles 

Cal. 
McKinney, Frank G., Harrison, 

Ark. 
McKinney, Oliver, Cannon City, 

Col. 
McMullen, Samuel J., St. Louis, 

Mo. 
Noish, John, Raton, N. M. 
Phipps, T. W., Bland, N. M. 
Petty, Archibald, Gallup, N. M. 
Pennington, Elijah, San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Preston, Robert A., Stiles, Tex. 
Quigg, George H., Gallup, N. M. 
Quinn, Walter D., San Marcial, 

N. M. 
Radcliff, William, Gallup, N. ^L 
Richards, Richard, Albuquerque, 

N. M. 
Ray burn, Harry C, Camden, la. 
Reid, Robert W., Raton, N. M. 
Absent on sick leave from June 24th to 
Sept. 8th on account of wound in side 
received in battle. G. S. to right 
hip. 
Ragland, Robert C, Guthrie, O. T. 
Roland, George, Deming, N. M. 

G. S. right side, June 24, 189B. 
Stillson, Earl, Topeka, Kan. 
Simmons, Charles M., Raton, N. M. 
Slaughter, Benjamin, San Antonio, 

Tex. 
Shannon, Charles W., Raton, N. M. 
Thomas, Neal, Aztec, N. M. 
Travis, Grant, Aztec, N. NL 
Van Horn, Eustace E., Halstead, 

Kan. 
Welch, Toney, Durango, Col. 
Whittington, Richard, Gallup, N. M. 
Whited, Lvman E., Raton, N. M. 
Wood, William D., Bland, N. M. 
Wright, Clarence, Springer, N. M. 



DISCHARGED. 

Swan, George D Gallup, N. M. 

Discharged on account of disability. 
Thompson, Frank M Aztec, N. M. 

Discharged on account of disability. 



DESERTED. 

McCulloch, Samuel T Springer, N. M. 

Deserted from camp at Tampa, Fla., Aug. 4, 1S98. 

256 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



DEA TIIS. 

Green, J. Knox Rancho, Tex. 

Died at Montauk Point, N. Y., Camp U. S. Trjops, Aug. 15, because of sickness 
which originated in line of duty. 

Lutz, Eugene A Raton, N. M. 

Detained in yellow-fever hospital by medical authorities when regiment left Cuba. 
Died in same, Aug. 15, 1898. 



KILLED IN ACTION. 

Haefner, Henry J Gallup, N. M, 

In battle, June 24, 1898. 

Russell, Marcus D Troy, N. Y. 

Killed in action, June 24, 189S. 



TRANSFERRED. 



Arendt, Henry J Sergeant. . , 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Corbe, M. C Trumpeter. 

Transferred to Troop K, May 11. 



.Gallup, N. M. 



TROOPERS, 



Bailie, Henry C, Gallup, N. M. 

Transferred from Troop I to Troop G, 
Aug. 31, 1898. 
Love, William J., Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Morgan, Schuyler C., Hazard, Ky. 

Transferred to Troop 1, May 12th. 
Morgan, Ulysses G., Hazard, Ky. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Odell, William D., Parkersburg, 

W. Va. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Donnelly, Rutherford B. H., Jeffer- 
son, d. T. 

Transferred to Troop I, Mav 12th. 
Evans, Evan, Gallup, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Groves, Oscar W., Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Jones, William H., Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 



Kania, Frank, Jamestown, N. D. 

Transferred to Troop K, May nth. 
Pierce, Ed., Chicago, 111. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Saville, Michael, Chicago, 111. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Sinnett, Lee, Maizeville, W. Va. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Tait, John H., Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Peabody, Harry, Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
McGowan, Alexander, Gallup, N. 

M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Brown, John, Gallup, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12th. 
Crockett, Joseph B., Raton, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May i3th. 



257 



APPENDIX A 

TROOP H. 
Captain George Curry. 

George Curry Captain Tularosa, N. M. 

William H. Kelly ist Lieutenant. . .East Las Vagas, N. M. 

Charles L. Ballard 2d Lieutenant . . . Roswell, N. M. 

Green A. Settle ist Sergeant . . . .Jackson Co., Ky. 

Nevin P. Gutilius Sergeant Tularosa, N. M. 

William A. Mitchell Sergeant El Paso, Tex. 

Oscar de Montell Sergeant Roswell, N. M. 

Thomas Darnell Sergeant Denver, Col. 

Willis J. Physioc Sergeant Columbia, S. C. 

Michael C. Rose Sergeant Silver City, N. M. 

Nova A. Johnson Sergeant Roswell, N. M. 

Morton M. Morgan Corporal Silver City, N. M. 

Arthur E. Williams Corporal Las Cruces, N. M. 

Frank Murray Corporal Roswell, N. M. 

Morgan O. B. Lewellyn Corporal Las Cruces, N. M. 

James C. Hamilton Corporal Roswell, N. M. 

George F. Jones Corporal El Paso, Tex. 

Charles P. Cochran Corporal Eddy, N. M. 

John M. Kelly Corporal El Paso, Te.x. 

Robert E. Ligon Trumpeter Beaumont, Tex. 

Gaston R. Dehumy Trumpeter Sante Fe, N. M. 

Uriah Sheard Blacksmith El Paso, Tex. 

Robert L. Martin Farrier Sante Fe, N. M. 

John Shaw Saddler Scott Co. , Iowa. 

Taylor B. Lewis Wagoner Las Cruces, N. M. 

TROOPERS. 

Allison, Jovillo, Bentonville, Ark. Dunkle, Frederick W., East Las 
Amonette, Albert B., Roswell, N. Vagas, N. M. 

M. Douglas, Arthur L., Eddy, N. M. 

Bendy, Cecil C, El Paso, Tex. Eaton, Frank A., Silver City, N, M. 

Black, Columbus L., Las Cruces, Fletcher, Augustus C, Silver Ci*v 

N. M. N. M. 

Bryan, John B., Las Cruces, N. M. Frye, Obey B., Flagstaff, Ariz. 

Bogardus, Frank, Las Cruces, N. M. Gasser, Louis, El Paso, Tex. 

Brown, Percy, Spring Hill, Tcnn. George, Ira W., Quincy, 111. 

Baker, Philip S. , Clinton, la. Grisby, James B., Deming, N. M. 

Bullard, John W., Gundaloupe, Tex. Hamilton, James M., Deming, N. M. 

Connell, Thomas J., Bennett, Tex. Herring, Leary O., Silver City, N. 
Corbett, Thomas F., Roswell, N. M. M. 

Cornish, Thomas J., Freestone, Tex. Hunt, Le Roy R., Cincinnati, O. 

Crawford, Clinton K., Cincinnati, O. Houston, Robert C, Hillsboro, N. 
Cone, John S. , Tularosa, N. M. M. 

Duran, Abel B., Silver City, N. M. James, Frank W., Marion Co., Ga. 



James, Frank 
Johnson, Chai 
Johnson, Han 



Duran, Jose L., Sante Fe, N. M. Johnson, Charles, Lund, Sweden. 

Dorsey, Lewis, Silver City, N. M. Johnson, Harry F. , Beaumont, Tex. 

Doty, George B., Santa Fe, N. M. Johnson, Lewis L., Beaumont, Tex. 

258 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Ketioe, Michael J., Ottawa, Canada. 
Kehn, Amandus, iSilver City, N. M. 
Kinnebrugh, Ollie A., Kl Paso, Tex. 
Kendall, Harry J., Coldsborg, Ky. 
Lawson, Frank H., Las Cruces, N. 

M. 
Lewis, Adelbert, Beaver Co., Utah. 
Lannon, John, Hillsboro, N. M. 
Mooney, I'homas A., Silver City, N. 

M. 
Moneckton, William J., San An- 
tonio, Tex. 
McAdams, Joel H. , Mt. Pilia, Tenn. 
McAdams, Richard P., Mt. Pilia, 

Tenn. 
McCarty, Frederick J., Mentzville, 

Mo. 
Murray, George F., Deming, N. M. 
Nobles. William H., Silver City, N. 

M. 
Neff, Nettleton, Cincinnati, O. 
Owens, Clay T., El Paso, 'I'ex. 
Ott, Charles H., Silver City, N. M. 
Pace, John, Bentonville, Ark. 
I'ipkins, Price. 

I'owell, Lory H., Roswell. N. M. 
Pronger, Norman W. , Silver City, 

N. M. 
Pollock, John F., Tularosa, N. M. 
Piersol, James M., Osborne, Mo. 



Roberson, James R., Belle Co., Tex. 
Rutherford, Bruce H., Pana, 111. 
Regan, John J., Beaumont, Tex. 
Sharp, Emerson E., Wanamaker, 

Tenn. 
Stewart, Newtown, El Paso, Tex. 
Scroggins, Oscar, Logan Co., 111. 
St. Clair, Edward C, New Orleans, 

La. 
Saucier, Harry S., New Orleans, 

La. 
Schutt, Henry, Warren, Pa. 
Sawyer, Benjamin, Hillsboro, 111. 
Thompson, Alexander M,, Deming, 

N. M. 
Traynor, William S., Wilcox, Ariz. 
Thomas, Theodore C, Leaven- 
worth, Kan. 
Waggoner, Daniel G., Roswell, N. 

M. 
Waggoner, Curtis C, Roswell, N. 

M. 
Wilson, Charles E., Boulder, Col. 
Wilkinson, Samuel L, Cincinnati, O. 
Woodson, Pickens E., Honey Grove, 

Tex. 
Wheeler, Frank G., Chautauqua 

Co., N. Y. 
Wickharn, Patrick A., Socorro, N. 

M. 



DISCHARGED. 

Rynerson, William L Sergeant Las Cruces, N. M. 

JJischarged from service of U.S. Army by reason of special order No. 145 Hd. 
Qrs., U. S. Army, Washington, D. C. 

TRANSFERRED. 

John B. Wiley Sergeant 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 

Joseph F. Kansky Sergeant 

John V. Morrison Sergeant Santa Fe, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 



PRIVATES. 



Lee, Robert E., Donabua, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop 1, May 12, 1898. 
Bennett, Orton A., Jack Co., Tex. 

Transferred to Troop 1, May 12, i8l(8. 
Brito, Jose, El Paso, Tex. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 
Brito, Frank C, El Paso, Tex. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 



Cate, James S., Grape Vine, Tex. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 
Casad, C. Darwin, Las Cruces, N. 

M. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 
Dolan, Thomas P., Ticonderoga, N. 

Y. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. 



259 



APPENDIX A 

Farrell, Frederick P., El Paso, Storms, Morris J., Roswell, N. M. 
'Yex. Transferred to Troop 1, May 12, 1898. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. Sullivan, William J., Manchester, 

Frenger, Muna C, Las Cruces, N. Va. ^ ^ ^ , ^^ 

^l Transferred to Troop I, May 12, iSoS. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, iSyS. Fritz, William H., Windsor, Conn. 

Hermeyer, Ernest H., Germany Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 189S. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. Eberman, Henry J., Bremen, Ger- 

Topling, Cal, Hamilton Co., Tex. i?^"^; ,, t, l' »„t u 

■',... J T- T ivT 00 Transferred from Troop K to Troop H, 

Iransferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. j^^^ ^^^ ^g^g Ke-transferred to K, 

Nehmer, William, Staten, Germany. June 8, 1898. Died. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. Bucklin, E. W., Chautauqua Co., 

Roediger, August, Charlotte, N. C. N. Y. 

Transferred to Troop I, May 12, 1898. Transferred to Troop L, June 8, 1898. 

Schafer, George, Pinos Altos, N. M. Wright, Grant, Cold Springs, N. Y. 

Transferred to Troop 1, May 12, 1898. Transferred to Troop L, June 8, 1898. 

DIED. 

Gosling, Frederick W Bedfordshire, Eng. 

Died in hospital at Camp Wikoff, N. Y., Aug. 19, 1898. 
Casey, Edwin Eugene Las Cruces, N. M. 

Died in hospital at Camp Wikofi, N. V., Sept. i, 1898. 

DESERTED. 

Ewell, Edward A Adrian, 111. 

Deserted, June 28, 1898, at Tampa, Fla. 
Miller, Samuel Roswell, N. M. 

Deserted, June 28, 1898, at Tampa, Fla. 



TROOP I. 

Captain Schuyler A. McGinnis. 

Schuyler A. McGinnis Captain Newkirk, O. T. 

Frederick W. Winfe ist Lieutenant Sante F6, Mex. 

Samuel Gren wald. .t . . ". '. '. 2d Lieutenant. .. .Prescott, Ariz 

John B. Wylic ist Sergeant Fort Bayard, N. Mex. 

SchuvlerC. Morgan Q. M. Sergeant. ..Durango, Col. 

John 'v. Morrison Sergeant Spnngerville, Ariz. 

WilHam R. Reber Sergeant , , ^, , xr xr 

Basil M . Ricketts Sergeant Lambs Club, N. Y. 

Percival Gassett Sergeant Dedham, Mass. 

James S. Gate Sergeant Grape Vine Tex. 

William H. Waffensmith Sergeant Raton, N. M. 

August Roediger Corporal Charlotte, N C. 

Numa C. Freuger Corporal Las Cruces, N. Mex. 

William J. Sullivan Corporal Silver City, N. M 

William J. Nehmer. Corporal Silver City, N. M. 

260 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Abraham L. Bainter Corporal . . . 

Hiram T. Brown Corporal . . . 

Errickson M. Nichols Corporal . . . 

George M. Kerney Corporal . . . 

Robert E. Lea. Trumpeter . 

Clarence H. Underwood Trumpeter , 

Charles A. Nehmer Blacksmith . 

Hayes Donnelly Farrier 

Leo G. Rogers Saddler 

Everett E. Holt Wagoner. . . 



.Colorado Springs, Col. 

.Albuquerque, N. M. 

.52 E. 78th St., New York City 

.Globe, Ariz. 

.Dona Ana, N. M. 

.Colorado Springs, Col. 

.Chicago, 111. 

.Jefferson, O. T. 

.I3ogart, Mo. 

. Coffey ville, Kan. 



TROOPERS. 



Alexis, George D., New Orleans, 

La. 
Arendt, Henry J., Hoboken, N. J. 
Armstrong, Charles M. 
Adkins, Joseph R. 
Bates, Vvilliam H. 
Fiarrowe, Hallett A. 
Hawcom, Joseph L., Bisbee, Ariz, 
licnnctt, Horton A., Tularosa, N. 

M. 
Brito, Frank C, Pinos Altos, N. M. 
Hrito, Jose, Los Angeles, Cal. 
P>rush, Charles A., Hanford, Cal. 
Bassage, Albert C, Corning, N. Y. 
Casad, Charles D., Mesilla, N. M. 
Cloud, William. 

Crockett, Joseph B., Topeka, Kan. 
Coe, George M., Albuquerque, N. 

M. 
Clark, Frank M., Hiawatha, Kan. 
Davis, Henry C, Santa Fe, N. M. 
Dolan, Thomas P., Pinos Altos, N. 

M. 
Denny, Robert W., Raton, Me.x. 
Duke, Henry K. , Lipscomb, Tex. 
l'"vans, Evan, Gallup, N. M. 
Fennel, William A., Reunion, Md. 
Flynn, Joseph F., Albuquerque, N. 

M. 
Geiger, Percy A., Durango, Col. 
Gooch, John R., Sante Fe, N. M. 
Groves, Oscar W., Raton, N. M. 
Goodrich, Ben Hedric. 
Giller, Alfred C. Topeka, Kan. 
Hermeyer, Ernest H., Roswell, N. 

M. 
Hickey, Walter, Wishua, N. H. 
Hogan, Michael. 

Jones, William H., Raton, N. M. 
Jopling, Cal, La Luz, N. M. 
King, Harry B., Raton, N. M. 
Larsen, Louis. 
Love, William J., Jersey City, N. J. 



McCoy, John, Monrovia, Cal. 
McGowan, Alexander, Gallup, N. 

M. 
Martin, John, Decanter, 111. 
Miller, Edwin H., Junction City, 

Kan. 
Miller, David R. 
Miller, Jacob H., Needles, Cal. 
Morgan, U. S. Grant, Durango, Col. 
Morris, Ben F. T., Raton, N. M. 
Moore, Roscoe E., Raton, N. M. 
North, Franklin H., 2 W. 35th St., 

New York City 
O'Dell, William W., Parkersburg, 

W. Va. 
Peabody, Harry, Raton, N. M. 
Pierce, Edward, Chicago, 111. 
Price, Stewart R. , F'lattsburg, Mo. 
Rafalowitz, Hyman, Philadelphia, 

Pa. 
Roberts, John P., Clayton, N. M. 
Reisig, Max, Y. M. C. A., St. Louis, 

Mo. 
Raulett, Charles, New Orleans, La. 
Reidy, John, Ottawa, Kan. 
Shornhorst, Carl J. Jr. 
Schafer, George, Pinos Altos, N. M. 
Sennett, Lee, Marysville, W. Va. 
Storms, Morris J., Centerpoint, Tex. 
Spencer, Edward John, Clay County, 

Tex. 
Tait, John H. 

Temple, Frank, Lafayette, Ind. 
Torbett, John T., Yale, Kan. 
Tritz, William H., Windsor, Conn. 
Townsend, Charles M., Faribault, 

Minn. 
Twyman, John L., Raton, N. M. 
Thompson, George. 
Williams, Thomas C. 
Wiley, Harry B., Santa Fe, N. M. 
Wisenberg, Roy O., Raton, N. M. 
Zeigler, Daniel J., Como, Mont. 



261 



APPENDIX A 



DISCHARGED. 

Brown, Harry R Private Tampa, Fla. 

Discharged at Tampa, Fla., Aug. 5, i8g8, per S. O. 153 A. G. O., dated June 30 
1898, and final statements forwarded to A. G. O., Washington, D. C, Aug. 3, 1898 

Young, Howard G Private 

Discharge to date from Aug. 23, 1898. 

TRANSFERRED. 

Girard, Alfred O ist Sergeant 

Transferred, July 18, 1S98, to 2d Army Corps. Camp Alger, per telegraphic instruc- 
tions A. G. O., Washington, D. C. 

Cowdin, Elliot C Corporal 

Transferred to Troop L 1st U. S. Vol. Cav., to date June 7, i8g8, per verbal order 
Reg. Commander. 

Fish, Hamilton Jr Sergeant 

Transferred to Troop L ist U. S. Vol. Cav., June 7, 1898, per verbal order Reg. 
Commander. Killed in battle, June 24, 1898. 

Wilson, Charles A Private 

Transferred to Hosp. Corps ist U. S. Vol. Cav., June 7, 1898, verbal order Reg. 
Commander. 
Greenway, John C 2d Lieutenant 

Promoted ist Lieut. Troop A ist U. S. Vol. Cav, 
Bailey, Harry C Private 

Transferred back to Troop G, Sept. i, 1898, per verbal order Reg. Commander. 

DIED. 

Tiffany, William 2d Lieutenant .... 

Died Aug. 26, 1898. 

DESERTED. 

Saville, Michael Private 

Deserted from Camp Wikoff, L. I., Aug. 20, 1898. 
Brown, John Private 

Deserted while en route from Camp Wood, San Antonio, Tex,, to camp at Tampa, 
F!a., June 3, 1898. 
Farrell, Fred. P Private 

Deserted while en route from Camp Wood, San Antonio, Tex., to camp at Tampa, 
Fla., June 3, 1898. 



TROOP K. 
Captain Woodbury Kane. 

Woodbury Kane Captain 319 Fifth Ave., New York City. 

Joseph A. Carr ist Lieutenant.2127 R. St., Washington, D. C. 

Horace K. Devereux 2d Lieutenant. Colorado Springs, Col. 

Wounded at San Juan, July i, 1S98 ; forearm and arm ; Mauser rifle. 

Frederik K. Lie ist Sergeant. . .Orgnn P. O., N. M. 

Thaddeus Higgins Sergeant 210 VV. 104th St., New York City. 

Reginald Ronalds Sergeant Knickerbocker Club, N. Y. City. 

Samuel G. Devore Sergeant Wheeling, W. Va. 

Wounded at El Poso, July ist ; left forearm ; shrapnel. 

262 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

Philip K. Sweet Sergeant 226 W. 121st St. . New York City. 

William J. Breen Sergeant 510 E. 144th St., New York City, 

Craig W. Wadsworth Sergeant Geneseo, N. Y. 

Henry W. Buel Sergeant 319 Fifth Ave., New York City. 

James B. Tailor Corporal .Ardsley on Hudson, .N. Y. 

Joseph S. Stevens Corporal .Narragansett Ave., Newport, R. I. 

Ma.\well Norman Corporal .Newport, R. I. 

p:dwin Coakley Corporal Prescott, Ariz. 

George Kerr, Jr Corporal East Downington, Pa. 

Henry S. Van Schaick Corporal 100 Broadway, New York City„ 

Frederick Herrig Corporal Pleasant Valley, Kalispel, Flat 

Head Co., Mont. 

Oscar Land Trumpeter 720 S 8th St., Denver, Col. 

George W. Knoblauch. ..Trumpeter ...205 W. 57th St., New York City. 

Benjamin A. Long Saddler New York City. 

Wounded at El Poso, July 1st ; left thigh. 

Thomas G. Bradley Farrier Potomac, Montgomery Co. , Md. 

George T. Crucius Blacksmith 50 Amanda St., Montgomery, Ala. 

Lee Burdwell Wagoner Langtry, Tex. 



TROOPERS. 



Armstrong, James T. 
Adams, John H., Selma, Ala. 

Wounded, July ist. 
Bell, Sherman, Colorado Springs, 

Col. 
Bernard, William C, Las Vegas, 

N. M. 
Batchelder, Wallace N., Chester, Pa. 
Bump, Arthur L., New London, O. 

Slightly wounded, July ist. 
Cameron, Charles H., McDonald, 

Pa. 
Campbell, Douglass. 
Cash, Walter S., Colorado Springs, 
Col. ° 

Wounded, July ist ; arm, slight ; Mau- 
ser rifle. 
Cooke, Henry B. 
Carroll, John F. , Hillsboro, Tex. 
Cartmell, Nathaniel M. , Lexintjton, 

Va. ^ 

Clagett, Jesse C, Moters Station, 

P'rederick Co., Md. 
Corbe, Max C, El Paso, Tex. 
Coville, Allen M., Topeka, Kan. 
Crowninshield, Francis B., Marble- 
head, Mass. 
Channing, Roscoe A.,34Park Place, 

New York City. 
Daniels, Benjamin F., Colorado 

Springs, Col. 
Davis, John, care W. S. Dickinson, 
Tarpon Springs, Fla. 



Easton, Stephen, Santa Fe, N. M. 

F^berman, Edwin. 

Emerson, Edwin, Collier's Weekly, 

New York City. 
Flemming, Clarence A. 
Fletcher, Henry, Green Point, Cum- 
berland Co., Pa. 
Folk, Theodore, Oklahoma City, 

O. T. 
Freeman, Elisha L., Burden, Kan. 
Holden, Prince A., Grayson Co., 

Tex. 
Hulme, Robert A., El Reno, O. T. 
James, William F., San Antonio, 

Te.x. 
Jordan, Andrew M. , Rossa, Tex. 
Kania, Frank, Jamestown, N. D. 
Langdon, Jesse D. , Fargo, N. D. 
Marshall, Creighton, 1807 G St., 

N. W., Washington, D. C. 
Maverick, Lewis, San Antonio, Tex. 
McGinty, William, Stillwater, O. 

T. 
McKoy, William J., Oshkosh, Wis. 
Mitchell, Mason, Lambs' Club, New 

York City. 

Wounded at El Poso, July ist ; left arm, 
slight ; shrapnel. 

Mitchell, William H., Salem, Mass. 

Montgomery, Lawrence N., Hemp- 
stead, Tex. 

Nicholson, Charles P., 1617 JohnSt., 
Baltimore, Md. 



263 



APPENDIX A 



Norris, Edmund S., Guthrie, O. Test, Clarence L., Austin, Tex. 

T. Transferred from 3d Penn. Inf. and re- 

Poey Alfred. ported for duty with troop at Mon- 

Pollak, Albin J. ^auk Point, Aug. 25th. 

Quaid, William, Newberg, N. Y. Toy, J. Frederick, 602 S. 42d SL, 

Robinson, Kenneth D., 55 Liberty Philadelphia, Pa. 

St., New York City. Transferred from 3d Penn. Inf. and re- 
Wounded on July 1st; right side, se- ported for duty with troops at Mon- 
vere; Mauser rifle. tank Point, Aug. 25th. 

Reed, Colton, San Antonio, Te.x. Tudor, William, 37 Brimer St., Bos- 
Smith, Frederick, Guthrie, O. T. ton, Mass. 

Smith, George L., Frankfort, Mich. Venable, Warner M., Stephenville, 

Smith, Joseph S., 1322 Brown St., Tex. 

Philadelphia, Pa. Wiberg, Axel E. 

Smith, Clarke T., 2008 Wallace St., Weitzel, John F., care Windsor 

Philadelphia, Pa. Hotel, Newkirk, O. T. 

Stockton, Richard, 218 W. Jersey Wilson, Frank M., Guthrie, O. T. 

St., Elizabeth, N. J. Woodward, John A., Taylor, Tex. 

Stephens, Oregon, Purdy, I. T. Wright, Grant, Cold Springs, N. Y. 

Thorp, Henry, Southampton, L. Young, James E., 628 W, 37th St., 

I. Los Angeles, Cal. 



DISCHARGED. 

Maloon, Winthrop L Private 

Discharged pcrS. O. No. 141, A. G. O. Dated June 6th. 
McMasters, Frederick D.. Private 

Discharged per S. O. No. 178, A. G. O. Dated July 30th, Washington, D. C. 
Ferguson, Robert M Sergeant 55 Liberty St., New York City. 

Discharged, Aug. loth, 1898. 
Worden, John L Private 27 W. 43d St., New York City. 

Discharged by way of favor per telegraphic order from Assistant Secretary of War. 
Dated Aug. 15th, Washington, D. C. 
Cosby, Arthur F Private 

Discharged per S. O. No. 103, A. G. O., Aug. 17th, Washington, D. C, to enable 
the soldier to accept a commission. Wounded, July 1st; right hand. 
Babcock, Campbell E. . . .Private The Plaza, Chicago, IlL 

Discharged. Sept. 5th, to accept commission. 
Lee, Joseph J Private Knoxville, Md. 

Discharged per S. O. No. 205, A. G. O., Washington, D. C, Aug. 31st. 



TRANSFERRED. 

Duran, Joseph L Private Santa Fe, N. M. 

Transferred to Troop H, this regiment, July 15th. 
Brandon, Perry H Private Douglass, Kan. 

Transferred to T''oop D, this regiment, July 2gth. 
David M. Goodrich ist Lieutenant. Akron, O. 

Transferred from Troop D, this regiment, Aug. nth. Transferred to Troop D, this 
regiment, Sept. 5th. 

264 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

DIED. 

Tr ' ,*^«^''^'ird M Private .... New York 

U:.d.t h.s ho„.e, 338 W. 71st St., New York City (date not known), from typhoid 

™S^of S^'" Lieutenant. . . .New York City. 

D£S£J?r£D. 
Staley, Frank Private. 

Ueserted from troop at San Antonio, Te.x' *M'ay ist 
Curzon Private. 

Ueserted from detachment at Tampa, Fla., June 13th. 

PJiOMOT£D. 

Jenkins, Micah J .Major Youngs Island, S. C. 

i'romoted to Major, Aug. n, 1898. 



TROOP L. 
Captain Richard C. Day. 

Richard C.Day Captain Vinita I T 

Shot through left shoulder on line of duty at San Tu'an T^fr'.L. m 
severe ; Mauser rifle. •' • ^*" shoulder and arm, 

John R. Thomas.. ist Lieutenant Muscoeee I T 

G. S. wound m nght lower leg at Las Guasimas, June 24th. G. s! right lee 

^[h"'' ^■.5^''^^' •,•,•• ^^ Lieutenant San Antonio Tex 

Llhanan W. Buckhn 1st Sergeant Jameirown N Y 

Jerome W. Henderhder Sergeant iVrn^l^ iC/iu 

William M. Simms • • Serfeam. ; '. ; ; ! ! " ' ' ' v!nka i T ' 

W ounded at San Juan, j uly x, 1898, in hne of duty. Leg • Mauser rifle 

™a"] ^. Carpenter Sergeant Vinita I T 

Wounded at ban Juan, July ist, in line of duty. Left thigh ; Mkuser Hfle 

.J^^ hy fragmen.-;f -^^ifff r^s^: J.;.y;.:''^^^^,, ,,, ^ 
fege'^H'^Se^vi' ^''"^^^"f ^^elsea, I. T. 

vv.gS-^rk;;;ju^V.£-S-';rdu,:-K^^?-r^iJh?:Mauser 

J°tl"^-Pa^is... Corporal Vinita I T 

Wounded at San Juan, July ,, 1898. Right leg and ^^m; Mauser rifle' 

^^,rP"el G. Davis Corporal Sardis Ark' 

Wounded at San Juan, July I, 1S98. ■^drais, Ark. 

265 



APPENDIX A 



Bud Parnell Corporal Muscogee, I. T. 

J oseph J. Roger Corporal Tillou, Ark. 

Wounded at San Juan, July i, 1898. Abdomen and arm ; Mauser rifle. 

George B. Dunnigan Corporal Vinita, I. T. 

Maynard R. Williams Corporal Fairland, I. T. 

Elliot C. Cowdin Corporal New York City. 

Mike Kinney Blacksmith Imlay, Mich. 

John R. Kean Farrier Maxwell, Ont. 

Wounded at Las (luasimas, June 24th. G. S. left shoulder and lungs. 

Nicholas H. Cochran Wagoner Vinita, I. T. 

Guy M. Babcock Saddler Cherryville, Kan. 

Thomas F. Meagher Trumpeter Muscogee, I. T. 

Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 24th. (j. S. left forearm. 
Frank R. McDonald Trumpeter .Oolagah, I. T. 

Wounded at San Juan, July i, 1898. Head ; Mauser rifle. 



TROOPERS. 



Adair, John M., Claremore, 1. T. 
Benson, Victor H. 
Carey, Oren E.. Clonau, la. 
Chilcoot, Frederick, Howels, Neb. 
Cook, James, Cherokee City, Ark. 
Cruse, James, St. Joe, Ark. 
Culver, Ed., Muscogee, I. T. 

Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 24th. 
G. S. breast. 
Davis, James C, Waggone, I. T. 
Damet, John P., Alexander, S. D. 

Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 24th. 
G. S. left shoulder. 
Dennis, David C, Nelson, Mo. 
Dobson, William H., Muscogee, 

L T. 
Ennis, Richard L., Cornell, 111. 
Evans, James R., Baldwin, Ark. 
Gilmore, Maurice E., Muscogee, I. 

T. 
Haley, Robert M., Wagoner, L T. 
Hawkins, Charles D., Vinita, 1. T. 
Heagert, Rudolph, Vinita, L T. 
Holderman, Bert. T., Artopa, Kan. 
Hughes, Frank, Vinita, 1. T. 
Hughes, William E., Vinita, I. T. 
Isbell, Thomas J., Vinita, I. T. 

Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 25th. 
G. S. neck, hip, and thumb. 
Jones, Levi, Vinita, I. T. 
Johns, William S., Hemasville, Mo. 
Kinkade, Ely ah S. , Muscogee, I. T. 
Knox, Robert G., Clinton, La. 
Lawrence, Richard, La Porte, Ind. 
Lane, Edward K. , Chetojia, Kan. 
Lane, Sanford J., Saupulpa, \. T. 
Lcntz, Edward, Bowling Green, O. 



Lewis, Frank A., Newark, N. J. 
Little, Rollie L., West Fork, Ark. 
McDonald, Asa W., Bearing Cross, 

Ark. 
McCamish, Andrew L., Bethel, Kan. 
Miller, John S., Garrison, Neb. 
Miller, Hoot, Chelsea, L T. 
Moore, John J., Vinita, L T. 
Oskison, Richard L., Vinita, L T. 

Wounded at San Juan, July ist. Left 
leg ; Mauser rifle. 
Owens, Edward L., Vinita, I. T. 
Parker, Ora E., Dickins, la. 

Wounded near .Santiatjo de Cuba. July 
I, 2, or 3, 1898. Right thigh, severe ; 
shrapnel. 
Pulley, William O., Marion, 111. 
Philpot, Leigh T., Brys.n, Ky. 
Poe, Nathaniel M., Adaa, I. T. 

Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 24th. 
G. S. foot. 
Price, Benjamin W., Eufaula, I. T. 
Rich, Allen K., Fort Gibson, I. T. 
Robertson, George W., Muscogee, 

I. T. 
Robinson, Frank P., Borbora, Kan. 
Russell, Daniel, Goodland, I. T. 
Scobey, Arthur E., Willis Point, 

Tex. 

Wounded at San Juan Hill, June i, 
1898. Right hand ; Mauser rifle. 
Sharp, Walter L., Chicago, 111. 
Skelton, James W., Trinity Mills, 

Tex. 
Smith, Bert., Vinita, I. T. 
Smith, Sylvester S., Vinita, I. T. 
Stcfens, Luke B., Rio Vista, I. T. 



266 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 

Stidham, Theodore E., Eufaiila, I. T. Whitney, Schuyler C, Pryor Creek, 

Swearinger, George, Maysville, Mo. 1. T. 

Taylor, Warren F., Hillsboro, Tex. Wounded at Las Guasimas, June 24lh. 

Thompson, Sylvester V. G. S. neck. 

Wounded at San Juan, July i, 1898. Wilkins, George W., Vinita, I. T. 

Left leg and arm ; Mauser rifle. Wilson, James E., Madrid, Mo. 

Wetmore, Robert C, Montclair, Winn, Arthur N., Muscogee, I. 



N.J. 



T. 



DISCHARGED. 



Hutchinson, Charles A Private 

Price, Walter W Private 

Hayes, Frank P ist Sergeant 

Discharged, June 24, 1898, to enable him to accept commission as 2d Lieut, in ist 
U. S. Vol. Cav. 

TRANSFERRED. 

Robert, William J Private 

Transferred to Troop M, June 7, 1898, by order Col. Wood. 

Byrne, John Sergeant Vinita, I. T. 

Transferred to Troop F, July 10, 1898, by order Col. Wood. 

DIED. 

Capron, Allyn K Captain Fort Sill, Okla. 

Killed at battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898. G. S. lungs. 
Fish, Hamilton Sergeant New York City. 

Killed at battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1898. G. S. heart. 
Dawson, Tilden W Private Vinita, L T. 

Killed at battle of Las Guasimas, June 24, 1S98. G. S. head. 
Santo, William T Private Chouteau, I. T. 

Killed at battle of San Juan, July i, 1898. Mauser ritle. 
Hendricks, Milo A Private Muscogee, L T. 

Mortally wounded at battle of San Juan, July ist ; died in hospital, July 6, 1898. 
Mauser rifle. 
Enyart, Silas R Private Sapulpa, \. T. 

Mortally wounded at San Juan, July 1st ; died in hospital, July 6, 1898. 



267 



APPENDIX A 

TROOP M. 
Captain Robert H. Bruce. 

Robert H. Bruce Captain Mineola, Tex. 

Ode C. Nichols ist Lieutenant Durant, I. T. 

Albert S. Johnson 2d Lieutenant Oklahoma City, O. T. 

Harry E. Berner ist Sergeant Durant, I. T. 

Joseph L. Smith Q. M. Sergeant . .Caddo, I. T. 

William E. Lloyd Sergeant Durant, I. T. 

Frederick E. Nichols Sergeant Purcell, I. T. 

Morency A. Hawkins Sergeant Tioga, Tex. 

Wilbert L. Poole Sergeant Durant, I. T. 

Otis B. Weaver Sergeant Mt. Vernon, Tex. 

Henry C. Foley Sergeant Muscogee, I. T. 

Samuel Downing Corporal .A.toka, I. T. 

Charles S. Lynch Corporal Caddo, I. T. 

John N. Jackson Corporal Caddo, L T. 

Frank U. Talman Corporal So. McAlester, I. T. 

Hiram S. Creech Corporal Durant, I. T. 

Charles J. Fandru Corporal Caddo, I. T. 

Theodore E. Schulz Corporal Tampa, Fla 

William G. Jones Corporal Ardmore, I. T. 

Frank Marion Trumpeter Muscogee, I. T. 

Charles J. Hokey Trumpeter Krebs, L T. 

John McMullen Wagoner Ardmore, I. T. 

John Hall Farrier Durant, I. T. 

Cragg Parsons Blacksmith Ardmore, I. T. 

Luther M. Kiethly Saddler Hartshorn, 1. T. 

Samuel Young Chief Cook Caddo, I. T, 

TROOPERS. 

Allaun, Jacob, Sapulpa, I. T. Dorell, Charles, Vinita, I. T. 

Byrd, Samuel J. W., Muscogee, I. Duping, Joseph, ^'uscogee, I. T. 

T. Flying, Crawford D., Muscogee. I. 
Boydstun, John F., Caddo, I. T T. 

Barlow, John W., Caddo. I. T. Fairman, Charles E., Ardmore, I. T. 

Barrinpton, John P., Ardmore, I. T. Griffith, Ezra E., Sapulpa, L T. 

Baird, Thompson M., Thurber,Te.x. Garland, George W., Ardmore, I. 
Brierty, Thomas, Tampa, Fla. T. 

Butler, Peter L., Kiowa, I. T. Hall, James T., Wagoner, I. T. 

Beal, Andy R., Durant, I. T. Hawes, Frederick W., Dennison, 
Bruce, Peter R., Wagoner, L T. Tex. 

Brown, Leon. Ardmore, I. T. Houchin, Willis C, Durant, I. T. 

Barney. Leland, Ardmore, L T. Hamilton, Troy, Hartshorne, I. T. 

Burks, Jesse S., Ardmore, L T. Howell, WiUiam, Muscogee, I. T. 

Case, George, Durant, I. T. Harris, Chester, Muscogee, I. T. 

Calhoun, Wesley, Durant, I. T. Hoffman, George B., Somerville, N. 
Carter, Arthur E., Ardmore, I. T. J. 

Garden, Horace W., Ardmore, I. T. Johnson, Bankston, Caddo, I. T. 

Cox, Walter, Durant, I. T. Johnson, Charles L., Ardmore, I. T. 

Cooper, Bud G., Muscogee, I. T. Johnson, Gordon, Birmingham, Ala. 

26S 



MUSTER-OUT ROLL 



Jones. Charles L. , McAlesfer, I. T. Reynolds, Benjamin F., Ardmore, 

Keithly, Ora E., Hartshorn. I. T. I. T. 

Kings, John, McAlester, I. T. Ross, William E., Ardmore, I. T. 

Kearns, Edward L., Tampa, Fla. Roberts, William J., Vinita, I. T. 

Mitchell, William, Wagoner, I. T. Sloane, Samuel P., So. McAlester, 

Madden, Charles E., Brooken, I. T. I. T. 

Murphy, William S., Caddo, I. T. Sykes, Marion, Muscogee, I. T. 

McPherren, Charles E., Caddo, I. T. Stewart, Henry J., Caddo, I. T. 

Maytubby, Bud, Caddo, I. T. Thomas, Jesse C, Caddo, I. T. 

Mcbaniel, Thomas E., Muscogee, Tyler, Edwin, Ardmore, I. T. 

I. T. Vickers, John W., So. McAlester, 

McPherson, Charles E., Caddo, I. I. T. 

T. Williams, Benjamin H., So. Mc- 

Morrell, Robert W., Elizabeth, N. Alester, I. T. 

J. Williams, George W., Ardmore, I. 

Owens, John M., Oologah, I. T. T. 

Pipkins, Virgil A., Brooken, I. T. Wolfe, John W., Ardmore, I. T. 

Rouse, John L., Durant, I. T. Webster, David, Durant, I. T. 

Rose. Lewis W., Los Angeles, Wagner, John D., Caddo, I. T. 

Cal. Woog, Benjamin B., Washington, 

Russell, Walter L., Caddo, I. T. D. C. 

Rynerson, Benjamin A., Durant, I. de Zychlinski, William T., Bismarck, 

T. N. D. 

TRANSFERRED. 

Lane, Sanford G Trooper Sapulpa, I. T. 

Transferred to Troop L ist U. S. V. C, June 8, 1898, per verbal order Reg. Com. 

DIED OF DISEASE. 

Kyle, Yancy Trooper McAlester, I. T. 

Died of typliiiid fever at Tampa, July 15, 1898. Final statements rendered and 
settled per Capt. Bruce. 

As said above, this is not a complete list of the wounded, or 
even of the dead, among the troopers. Moreover, a number of officers 
and men died from fever soon after the regiment was mustered out. 
Twenty-eight field and line officers landed in Cuba on June 22d ; 
ten of them were killed or wounded during the nine days following. 
Of the five regiments of regular cavalry in the division, one, the 
Tenth, lost eleven officers ; none of the others lost more than six. 
The loss of the Rough Riders in enlisted men was heavier than 
that of any other regiment in the cavalry division. Of the nine 
infantry regiments in Kent's division, one, the Sixth, lost eleven 
officers ; none of the others as many as we did. None of the nine 
suffered as heavy a loss in enlisted men, as they were not engaged 
at Las Guasimas. 

No other regiment in the Spanish-American War suffered as 
heavy a loss as the First United States Volunteer Cavalry. 



269 



APPENDIX B 

[Before it was sent, this letter was read to and approved 
by every officer of the regiment who had served through 
the Santiago campaign.] 

[Copy.] 

Camp Wikoff, September lo, 1898. 
To THE Secretary of War. 

Sir : In answer to the circular issued by command of 
Major-General Shafter under date of September 8, 1898, 
containing a request for information by the Adjutant- 
General of September 7 th, I have the honor to report as 
follows : 

I am a little in doubt whether the fact that on certain 
occasions my regiment suffered for food, etc., should be 
put down to an actual shortage of su7>plies or to general 
defects in the system of administration. Thus, when the 
regiment arrived in Tampa after a four days' journey by 
cars from its camp at San Antonio, it received no food 
whatever for twenty-four hours, and as the travel rations 
had been completely exhausted, food for several of the 
troops was purchased by their officers, who, of course, have 
not been reimbursed by the Government. In the same 
way we were short one or two meals at the time of em- 
barking at Port Tampa on the transport ; but this I think 
was due, not to a failure in the quantity of supplies, but to 
the lack of system in embarkation. 

270 



APPENDIX B 

As with the other regiments, no information was given 
in advance what transports we should take, or how we 
should proceed to get aboard, nor did anyone exercise any 
supervision over the embarkation. Each regimental com- 
mander, so far as I know, was left to find out as best he 
could, after he was down at the dock, what transport had 
not been taken, and then to get his regiment aboard it, if 
he was able, before some other regiment got it. Our regi- 
ment was told to go to a certain switch, and take a train for 
Port Tampa at twelve o'clock, midnight. The train never 
came. After three hours of waiting we were sent to an- 
other switch, and finally at six o'clock in the morning 
got possession of some coal-cars and came down in them. 
When we reached the quay where the embarkation was 
proceeding, everything was in utter confusion. The quay 
was piled with stores and swarming with thousands of men 
of different regiments, besides onlookers, etc. The com- 
manding General, when we at last found him, told Col- 
onel Wood and myself that he did not know what ship 
we were to embark on, and that we must find Colonel 
Humphrey, the Quartermaster-General. Colonel Hum- 
phrey was not in his office, and nobody knew where he 
was. The commanders of the different regiments were 
busy trying to find him, while their troops waited in the 
trains, so as to discover the ships to which they were allot- 
ted — some of these ships being at the dock and some in 
mid-stream. After a couple of hours' search. Colonel 
Wood found Colonel Humphrey and was allotted a ship. 
Immediately afterward I found that it had already been 
allotted to two other regiments. It was then coming to 
the dock. Colonel Wood boarded it in mid-stream to keep 
possession, while I double-quicked the men down from the 
cars and got there just ahead of the other two regiments. 

271 



APPENDIX B 

One of these regiments, I was afterward informed, spent 
the next thirty-six hours in cars in consequence. We suf- 
fered nothing beyond the loss of a couple of meals, which, 
it seems to me, can hardly be put down to any failure in 
the quantity of supplies furnished to the troops. 

We were two weeks on the troop-ship Yucatan, and as 
we were given twelve days' travel rations, we of course fell 
short toward the end of the trip, but eked things out with 
some of our field rations and troop stuff. The quality of 
the travel rations given to us was good, except in the im- 
portant item of meat. The canned roast beef is worse 
than a failure as part of the rations, for in effect it amounts 
to reducing the rations by just so much, as a great majority 
of the men find it uneatable. It was coarse, stringy, taste- 
less, and very disagreeable in appearance, and so unpalata- 
ble that the effort to eat it made some of the men sick. 
Most of the men preferred to be hungry rather than eat it. 
If cooked in a stew with plenty of onions and potatoes — 
i.e., if only one ingredient in a dish with other more savory 
ingredients — it could be eaten, especially if well salted and 
peppered ; but, as usual (what I regard as a great mistake), 
no salt was issued with the travel rations, and of course 
no potatoes and onions. There were no cooking facilities 
on the transport. When the men obtained any, it was by 
bribing the cook. Toward the last, when they began to 
draw on the field rations, they had to eat the bacon raw. 
On the return trip the same difficulty in rations obtained — 
i.e., the rations were short because the men could not eat 
the canned roast beef, and had no salt. We purchased of 
the ship's supplies some flour and pork and a little rice for 
the men, so as to relieve the shortage as much as possible, 
and individual sick men were helped from private sources 
by officers, who themselves ate what they had purchased 

272 



APPENDIX B 

in Santiago. As nine-tenths of the men were more or less 
sick, the unattractiveness of the travel rations was doubly 
unfortunate. It would have been an excellent thing for 
their health if we could have had onions and potatoes, and 
means for cooking them. Moreover, the water was very- 
bad, and sometimes a cask was struck that was positively 
undrinkable. The lack of ice for the weak and sickly men 
was very much felt. Fortunately there was no epidemic, 
for there was not a place on the ship where patients could 
have been isolated. 

During the month following the landing of the army in 
Cuba the food-supplies were generally short in quantity, 
and in quality were never such as were best suited to men 
undergoing severe hardships and great exposure in an un- 
healthy tropical climate. The rations were, I understand, 
the same as those used in the Klondike. In this connec- 
tion, I call especial attention to the report of Captain 
Brown, made by my orders when I was Brigade-Com- 
mander, and herewith appended. I also call attention to 
the report of my own Quartermaster. Usually we re- 
ceived full rations of bacon and hardtack. The hard- 
tack, however, was often mouldy, so that parts of cases, 
and even whole cases, could not be used. The bacon was 
usually good. But bacon and hardtack make poor food 
for men toiling and fighting in trenches under the mid- 
summer sun of the tropics. The ration of coffee was often t 
short, and that of sugar generally so ; we rarely got any 
vegetables. Under these circumstances the men lost 
strength steadily, and as the fever speedily attacked them, 
they suffered from being reduced to a bacon and hardtack 
diet. So much did the shortage of proper food tell upon 
their health that again and again officers were compelled 
to draw upon their private purses, or upon the Red Cross 

273 



APPENDIX B 

Society, to make good the deficiency of the Government 
supply. Again and again we sent down improvised pack- 
trains composed of officers' horses, of captured Spanish 
cavalry ponies, or of mules which had been shot or aban- 
doned but were cured by our men. These expeditions — 
sometimes under the Chaplain, sometimes under the Quar- 
termaster, sometimes under myself, and occasionally under 
a trooper — would go to the sea-coast or to the Red Cross 
head-quarters, or, after the surrender, into the city of San- 
tiago, to get food both for the well and the sick. The 
Red Cross Society rendered invaluable aid. For example, 
on one of these expeditions I personally brought up 600 
pounds of beans ; on another occasion I personally brought 
up 500 pounds of rice, 800 pounds of cornmeal, 200 
pounds of sugar, 100 pounds of tea, loo pounds of oatmeal, 
5 barrels of potatoes, and two of onions, with cases of 
canned soup and condensed milk for the sick in hospitals. 
Every scrap of the food thus brought up was eaten with 
avidity by the soldiers, and put new heart and strength 
into them. It was only our constant care of the men in 
this way that enabled us to keep them in any trim at all. 
As for the sick in the hospital, unless we were able from 
outside sources to get them such simple delicacies as rice 
and condensed milk, they usually had the alternative of 
eating salt pork and hardtack or going without. After 
^ each fight we got a good deal of food from the Spanish 
camps in the way of beans, peas, and rice, together with 
green coffee, all of which the men used and relished 
greatly. In some respects the Spanish rations were prefer- 
able to ours, notably in the use of rice. After we had 
been ashore a month the supplies began to come in in 
abundance, and we then fared very well. Up to that time 
the men were under-fed, during the very weeks when the 

274 



APPENDIX B 

heaviest drain was being made upon their vitality, and the 
deficiency was only partially supplied through the aid of 
the Red Cross, and out of the officers' pockets and the 
pockets of various New York friends who sent us money. 
IJefore, during, and immediately after the fights of June 
24th and July ist, we were very short of even the bacon 
and hardtack. About July 14th, when the heavy rains 
interrupted communication, we were threatened with fam- 
ine, as we were informed that there was not a day's supply 
of provisions in advance nearer than the sea-coast ; and 
another twenty-four hours' rain would have resulted in a 
complete break-down of communications, so that for sev- 
eral days we should have been reduced to a diet of mule- 
meat and mangos. At this time, in anticipation of such a 
contingency, by foraging and hoarding we got a httle 
ahead, so that when our supplies were cut down for a day 
or two we did not suffer much, and were even able to fur- 
nish a little aid to the less fortunate First Illinois Regiment, 
which was camped next to us. Members of the Illinois 
Regiment were offering our men $1 apiece for hardtacks. 

I wish to bear testimony to the energy and capacity of 
Colonel Weston, the Commissary-General with the expedi- 
tion. If it had not been for his active aid, we should have 
fared worse than we did. All that he could do for us, he 
most cheerfully did. 

As regards the clothing, I have to say: As to the first 
issue, the blue shirts were excellent of their kind, but al- 
together too hot for Cuba. They are just what I used to 
wear in Montana. The leggings were good ; the shoes 
were very good ; the undershirts not very good, and the 
drawers bad — being of heavy, thick canton flannel, difficult 
to wash, and entirely unfit for a tropical climate. The 
trousers were poor, wearing badly. We did not get any 

275 



APPENDIX B 

other clothing until we were just about to leave Cuba, by 
which time most of the men were in tatters ; some being 
actually barefooted, while others were in rags, or dressed 
partly in clothes captured from the Spaniards, who were 
much more suitably clothed for the climate and place than 
we were. The ponchos were poor, being inferior to the 
Spanish rain-coats which we captured. 

As to the medical matters, I invite your attention, not 
only to the report of Dr. Church accompanying this letter, 
but to the letters of Captain Llewellen, Captain Day, and 
Lieutenant Mcllhenny. I could readily produce a hun- 
dred letters on the lines of the last three. In actual medi- 
cal supplies, we had plenty of quinine and cathartics. We 
were apt to be short on other medicines, and we had noth- 
ing whatever in the way of proper nourishing food for our 
sick and wounded men during most of the time, except 
what we were able to get from the Red Cross or purchase 
with our own money. We had no hospital tent at all un- 
til I was able to get a couple of tarpaulins. During much 
of the time my own fly was used for the purpose. We had no 
cots until by individual effort we obtained a few, only three 
or four days before we left Cuba. During most of the time 
the sick men lay on the muddy ground in blankets, if they 
had any ; if not, they lay without them until some of the 
well men cut their own blankets in half. Our regimental 
surgeon very soon left us, and Dr. Church, who was repeat- 
edly taken down with the fever, was left alone — save as he 
was helped by men detailed from among the troopers. 
Both he and the men thus detailed, together with the reg- 
ular hospital attendants, did work of incalculable service. 
We had no ambulance with the regiment. On the battle- 
field our wounded were generally sent to the rear in mule- 
wagons, or on litters which were improvised, At other 

276 



APPENDIX B 

times we would hire the little springless Cuban carts. But 
of course the wounded suffered greatly in such convey- 
ances, and moreover, often we could not get a wheeled 
vehicle of any kind to transport even the most serious 
cases. On the day of the big fight, July ist, as far as we 
could find out, there were but two ambulances with the 
army in condition to work — neither of which did we ever 
see. Later there were, as we were informed, thirteen all 
told ; and occasionally after the surrender, by vigorous 
representations and requests, we would get one assigned to 
take some peculiarly bad cases to the hospital. Ordinarily, 
however, we had to do with one of the makeshifts enumer- 
ated above. On several occasions I visited the big hos- 
pitals in the rear. Their condition was frightful beyond 
description from lack of supplies, lack of medicine, lack! 
of doctors, nurses, and attendants, and especially from lack 
of transportation. The wounded and sick who were sent 
back suffered so much that, whenever possible, they re- 
turned to the front. Finally my brigade commander, 
General Wood, ordered, with my hearty acquiescence, 
that only in the direst need should any men be sent to the 
rear — no matter what our hospital accommodations at the 
front might be. The men themselves preferred to suffer 
almost anything lying alone in their little shelter-tents, 
rather than go back to the hospitals in the rear. I invite 
attention to the accompanying letter of Captain Llew- 
ellen in relation to the dreadful condition of the wounded 
on some of the transports taking them North. 

The greatest trouble we had was with the lack of trans- 
portation. Under the order issued by direction of Gen- 
eral Miles through the Adjutant-General on or about May 
8th, a regiment serving as infantry in the field was entitled 
to twenty-five wagons. We often had one, often none, 

277 



APPENDIX B 

sometimes two, and never as many as three. We had a 
regimental pack-train, but it was left behind at Tampa. 
During most of the time our means of transportation were 
chiefly the improvised pack-trains spoken of above ; but as 
the mules got well they Avere taken away from us, and so 
were the captured Spanish cavalry horses. Whenever we 
shifted camp, we had to leave most of our things behind, 
so that the night before each fight was marked by our 
sleeping without tentage and with very little food, so far as 
officers were concerned, as everything had to be sacrificed to 
getting up what ammunition and medical supplies we had. 
Colonel Wood seized some mules, and in this manner got 
up the medical supplies before the fight of June 24th, when 
for three days the officers had nothing but what they wore. 
There was a repetition of this, only in worse form, before 
and after the fight of July ist. Of course much of this 
was simply a natural incident of war, but a great deal 
could readily have been avoided if we had had enough 
transportation; and I was sorry not to let my men be as 
comfortable as possible and rest as much as possible just 
before going into a fight when, as on July ist and 2d, they 
might have to be forty-eight hours with the minimum 
quantity of food and sleep. The fever began to make 
heavy ravages among our men just before the surrender, 
and from that time on it became a most serious matter to 
shift camp, with sick and ailing soldiers, hardly able to 
walk — not to speak of carrying heavy burdens — when we 
had no transportation. Not more than half of the men 
could carry their rolls, and yet these, with the officers' bag- 
gage and provisions, the entire hospital and its appurte- 
nances, etc., had to be transported somehow. It was usu- 
ally about three days after we reached a new camp before 
the necessaries which had been left behind could be 

27S 



APPENDIX B 

brought up, and during these three days we had to get 
along as best we could. The entire lack of transportation 
at first resulted in leaving most of the troop mess-kits on 
the beach, and we were never able to get them. The men 
cooked in the few utensils they could themselves carry 
This rendered it impossible to boil the drinking water 
Closely allied to the lack of transportation was the lack of 
means to land supplies from the transports. 

In my opinion, the deficiency in transportation was the 
worst evil with which we had to contend, serious though 
some of the others were. I have never .served before, so 
have no means of comparing this with previous campaigns 
I was often told by officers who had seen service against 
the Indians that, relatively to the size of the army, and 
the character of the country, we had only a small fraction 
of the transportation always used in the Indian campaigns 
As far as my regiment was concerned, we certainly did not 
have one-third of the amount absolutely necessary, if it was 
to be kept in fair condition, and we had to partially make 
good the deficiency by the most energetic resort to all 
kinds of makeshifts and expedients. 

Yours respectfully, 
(Signed) Theodore Roosevelt, 

Colonel First United States Cavalry. 
Forwarded through military channels. 
(5 enclosures.) 

First Endorsement. 

Head-quarters Fifth Army Corps. 
Camp Wikoff, September 18, 1898 
Respectfully forwarded to the Adjutant-General of the 
Army. 

(Signed) William R. Shafter, 

Major- General Commanding. 
279 



APPENDIX C 

[The following is the report of the Associated Press 
correspondent of the ''round-robin" incident. It is 
literally true in every detail. I was present when he was 
handed both letters ; he was present while they were being 
written.] 

Santiago de Cuba, August 3d (delayed in transmis- 
sion). — Summoned by Major-General Shafter, a meeting 
was held here this morning at head-quarters, and in the 
presence of every commanding and medical officer of the 
Fifth Army Corps, General Shafter read a cable message 
from Secretary Alger, ordering him, on the recommenda- 
tion of Surgeon-General Sternberg, to move the army into 
the interior, to San Luis, where it is healthier. 

As a result of the conference General Shafter will insist 
upon the immediate withdrawal of the army North. 

As an explanation of the situation the following letter 
from Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, commanding the First 
Cavalry, to General Shafter, was handed by the latter to 
the correspondent of The Associated Press for publication : 

Major-General Shafter. 

Sir : In a meeting of the general and medical officers 
called by you at the Palace this morning we were all, as 
you know, unanimous in our views of what should be done 
with the army. To keep us here, in the opinion of every 
officer commanding a division or a brigade, will simply 
involve the destruction of thousands. There is no possible 

280 



APPENDIX C 

reason for not shipping practically the entire command 
North at once. 

Yellow-fever cases are very few in the cavalry division, 
where I command one of the two brigades, and not one 
true case of yellow fever has occurred in this division, 
except among the men sent to the hospital at Siboney, 
where they have, I believe, contracted it. 

But in this division there have been 1,500 cases of 
malarial fever. Hardly a man has yet died from it, but 
the whole command is so weakened and shattered as to be 
ripe for dying like rotten sheep, when a real yellow-fever 
epidemic instead of a fake epidemic, like the present one, 
strikes us, as it is bound to do if we stay here at the height 
of the sickness season, August and the beginning of Sep- 
tember. Quarantine against malarial fever is much like 
quarantining against the toothache. 

All of us are certain that as soon as the authorities at 
Washington fully appreciate the condition of the army, 
we shall be sent home. If we are kept here it will in all 
human possibility mean an appalling disaster, for the sur- 
geons here estimate that over half the army, if kept here 
during the sickly season, will die. 

This is not only terrible from the stand-point of the 
individual lives lost, but it means ruin from the stand- 
point of military efficiency of the flower of the American 
army, for the great bulk of the regulars are here with 
you. Th^ sick list, large though it is, exceeding four 
thousand, affords but a faint index of the debilitation of 
the army. Not twenty per cent, are fit for active work. 

Six weeks on the North Maine coast, for instance, or 
elsewhere where the yellow-fever germ cannot possibly 
propagate, would make us all as fit as fighting-cocks, as 
able as we are eager to take a leading part in the great 
campaign against Havana in the fall, even if we are not 
allowed to try Porto Rico. 

We can be moved North, if moved at once, with ab- 
solute safety to the country, although, of course, it would 
have been infinitely better if we had been moved North or 
to Porto Rico two weeks ago. If there were any object in 

281 



APPENDIX C 

keeping us here, we would face yellow fever with as much 
indifference as we faced bullets. But there is no object. 

The four immune regiments ordered here are sufficient 
to garrison the city and surrounding towns, and there is 
absolutely nothing for us to do here, and there has not 
been since the city surrendered. It is impossible to move 
into the interior. Every shifting of camp doubles the sick- 
rate in our present weakened condition, and, anyhow, the 
interior is rather worse than the coast, as I have found by 
actual reconnoissance. Our present camps are as healthy 
as any camps at this end of the island can be. 

I write only because I cannot see our men, who have 
fought so bravely and who have endured extreme hardship 
and danger so uncomplainingly, go to destruction without 
striving so far as lies in me to avert a doom as fearful as it 
is unnecessary and undeserved. Yours respectfully, 

Theodore Roosevelt, 
Colonel Commanding Second Cavalry B)'igade. 

After Colonel Roosevelt had taken the initiative, all 
the American general officers united in a "round robin " 
addressed to General Shafter. It reads: 

We, the undersigned officers commanding the various 
brigades, divisions, etc., of the Army of Occupation in 
Cuba, are of the unanimous opinion that this army should 
be at once taken out of the island of Cuba and sent to some 
point on the Northern sea-coast of the United States; that 
can be done without danger to the people of the United 
States ; that yellow fever in the army at present is not 
epidemic; that there are only a few sporadic cases; but 
that the army is disabled by malarial fever to the extent 
that its efficiency is destroyed, and that it is in a condition 
to be practically entirely destroyed by an epidemic of yel- 
low fever, which is sure to come in the near future. 

We know from the reports of competent officers and 
from personal observations that the army is unable to 
move into the interior, and that there are no facilities for 
such a move if attempted, and that it could not be attempt- 
ed until too late. Moreover, the best medical authorities 

282 



APPENDIX C 

of the island say that with our present equipment we could 
not live in the interior during the rainy season without 
losses from malarial fever, which is almost as deadly as 
yellow fever. 

This army must be moved at once, or perish. As the 
army can be safely moved now, the persons responsible for 
preventing such a move will be resi^onsible for the un- 
necessary loss of many thousands of lives. 

Our opinions are the result of careful personal obser- 
vation, and they are also based on the unanimous opinion 
of our medical officers with the army, who understand the 
situation absolutely. J. Ford Kent, 

Major-General Volunteers Commandini^ First Division, Fifth 
Corps. 

J. C. Bates, 

Major-General Volimteers Comma mi ing Provisional Division. 

Adnah R. Chaffee, 

Major-General Commanding Third Brigade, Second Division. 

Samuel S. Summer, 

Brigadier-General Volunteers Commanding First Brigade, 
Cavalry. 

Will Ludlow, 

Brigadier-General Volunteers Commanding First Brigade, 
Second Division. 

Adelbert Ames, 

Brigadier-General Volunteers Commanding Third Brigade, 
First Division. 

Leonard Wood, 

Brigadier - General Volunteers Commanding the City of 
Santiago. 

Theodore Roosevelt, 

Colonel Commanding Second Cavalry Brigade. 

Major M. W. Wood, the chief Surgeon of the First 
Division, said : " The army must be moved North," add- 
ing, with emphasis, " or it will be unable to move itself." 

General Ames has sent the following cable message to 
Washington : 

Charles H. Allen, Assistant Secretary of the Navy : 

This army is incapable, because of sickness, of march- 
ing anywhere except to the transports. If it is ever to 
return to the United States it must do so at once. 

283 



APPENDIX D 

CORRECTIONS 

It has been suggested to me that when Bucky O'Neill 
spoke of the vultures tearing our dead, he was thinking of 
no modern poet, but of the words of the prophet Ezekiel : 
" Speak unto every feathered fowl ... ye shall eat the 
flesh of the mighty and drink the blood of the princes 
of the earth." 

At San Juan the Sixth Cavalry was under Major Lebo, 
a tried and gallant officer. I learn from a letter of Lieu- 
tenant McNamee that it was he, and not Lieutenant Hart- 
wick, by whose orders the troopers of the Ninth cast down 
the fence to enable me to ride my horse into the lane. But 
one of the two lieutenants of B troop was overcome by the 
heat that day ; Lieutenant Rynning was with his troop 
until dark. 

One night during the siege, when we were digging 
trenches, a curious stampede occurred (not in my own reg- 
iment) which it may be necessary some time to relate. 

Lieutenants W. E. Shipp and W. H. Smith were killed, 
not far from each other, while gallantly leading their troops 
on the slope of Kettle Hill. Each left a widow and young 
children. 

Captain (now Colonel) A. L. Mills, the Brigade Adju- 
tant-General, has written me some comments on my ac- 
count of the fight on July ist. It was he himself who first 

284 



APPENDIX D 

brought me word to advance. I then met Colonel Dorst — 
who bore the same message — as I was getting the regiment 
forward. Captain Mills was one of the officers I had sent 
back to get orders that would permit me to advance ; he 
met General Sumner, who gave him the orders, and he 
then returned to me. In a letter to me Colonel Mills says 
in part : 

I reached the head of the regiment as you came out of 
the lane and gave you the orders to enter the action. These 
were that you were to move, with your right resting along 
the wire fence of the lane, to the support of the regular 
cavalry then attacking the hill we were facing. "The red- 
roofed house yonder is your objective," I said to you. You 
moved out at once and quickly forged to the front of your 
regiment. I rode in rear, keeping the soldiers and troops 
closed and in line as well as the circumstances and condi- 
tions permitted. We had covered, I judge, from one-half 
to two-thirds the distance to Kettle Hill when Lieutenant- 
Colonel Garlington, from our left flank, called to me that 
troops were needed in the meadow across the lane. I put 
one troop (not three, as stated in your account *) across 
the lane and went with it. Advancing with the troop, I 
began immediately to pick up troopers of the Ninth Cavalry 
who had drifted from their commands, and soon had so 
many they demanded nearly all my attention. With a line 
thus made up, the colored troopers on the left and yours on 
the right, the portion of Kettle Hill on the right of the red- 
roofed house was first carried. I very shortly thereafter 
had a strong firing-line established on the crest nearest the 
enemy, from the corner of the fence around the house to 
the low ground on the right of the hill, which fired into the 
strong line of conical straw hats, whose brims showed just 
above the edge of the Spanish trench directly west of that 
part of the hill.f These hats made a fine target ! I had 

* The other two must have followed on their own initiative. 

f These were the Spaniards in the trenches we carried when we 
charged from Kettle Hill, after the infantry had taken the San Juan 
block-house. 

285 



APPENDIX D 

placed a young officer of your regiment in charge of the 
portion of the line on top of the hill, and was about to go 
to the left to keep the connection of the brigade — Captain 
McBlain, Ninth Cavalry, just then came up on the hill 
from the left and rear — when the shot struck that put me 
out of the fight. 

There were many wholly erroneous accounts of the 
Guasimas fight published at the time, for the most part 
written by newspaper-men who were in the rear and utterly 
ignorant of what really occurred. Most of these accounts 
possess a value so purely ephemeral as to need no notice. 
Mr. Stephen Bonsai, however, in his book, ''The Fight 
for Santiago," has cast one of them in a more permanent 
form J and I shall discuss one or two of his statements, 

Mr. Bonsai was not present at the fight, and, indeed, so 
far as I know, he never at any time was with the cavalry in 
action. He puts in his book a map of the supposed skir- 
mish ground ; but it bears to the actual scene of the fight only 
the well-known likeness borne by Monmouth to Macedon. 
There was a brook on the battle-ground, and there is a 
brook in Mr. Bonsai's map. The real brook, flowing down 
from the mountains, crossed the valley road and ran down 
between it and the hill-trail, going nowhere near the latter. 
The Bonsai brook flows at right angles to the course of the 
real brook and crosses both trails — that is, it runs up hill. 
It is difficult to believe that the Bonsai map could have 
been made by any man who had gone over the hill-trail 
followed by the Rough Riders and who knew where the 
fighting had taken place. The position of the Spanish line 
on the Bonsai map is inverted compared to what it really 
was. 

On page 90 Mr. Bonsai says that in making the " pre- 
cipitate advance " there was a rivalry between the regulars 

286 



APPENDIX D 

and Rough Riders, which resulted in each hurrying reck- 
lessly forward to strike the Spaniards first. On the contrary 
The official reports show that General Young's column 
waited for some time after it got to the Spanish position, so 
as to allow the Rough Riders (who had the more difficult 
trail) to come up. Colonel Wood kept his column walking 
at a smart pace, merely so that the regulars might not be 
left unsupported when the figlit began ; and as a matter of 
fact, it began almost simultaneously on both wings. 

On page 91 Mr. Bonsai speaks of " The foolhardy for- 
mation of a solid column along a narrow trail, which 
brought them (the Rough Riders) . . . within point-blank 
range of the Spanish rifles and within the unobstructed 
sweep of their machine-guns." He also speaks as if the 
advance should have been made with the regiment deployed 
through the jungle. Of course, the only possible way by 
which the Rough Riders could have been brought into 
action in time to support the regulars was by advancing in 
column along the trail at a good smart gait. As soon as our 
advance-guard came into contact with the enemy's out- 
post we deployed. No firing began for at least five min- 
utes after Captain Capron sent back word that he had 
come upon the Spanish outpost. At the particular point 
where this occurred there was a dip in the road, Avhich 
probably rendered it, in Capron's opinion, better to keep 
part of his men in it. In any event, Captain Capron, who 
was as skilful as he was gallant, had ample time between 
discovering the Spanish outpost and the outbreak of the 
firing to arrange his troop in the formation he deemed 
best. His troop was not in solid formation ; his men were 
about ten yards apart. Of course, to have walked forward 
deployed through the jungle, prior to reaching the ground 
where we were to fight, would have been a course of pro- 

2S7 



APPENDIX D 

cedure so foolish as to warrant the summary court-martial 
of any man directing it. We could not have made half a 
mile an hour in such a formation, and would have been at 
least four hours too late for the fighting. 

On page 92 Mr. Bonsai says that Captain Capron's 
troop was ambushed, and that it received the enemy's fire 
a quarter of an hour before it was expected. This is sim- 
ply not so. Before the column stopped we had passed a 
dead Cuban, killed in the preceding day's skirmish, and 
General Wood had notified me on information he had re- 
ceived from Capron that we might come into contact with 
the Spaniards at any moment, and, as I have already said, 
Captain Capron discovered the Spanish outpost, and we 
halted and partially deployed the column before the firing 
began. We were at the time exactly where we had ex- 
pected to come across the Spaniards. Mr. Bonsai, after 
speaking of L Troop, adds: "The remaining troops of 
the regiment had travelled more leisurely, and more than 
half an hour elapsed before they came up to Capron's sup- 
port." As a matter of fact, all the troops travelled at ex- 
actly the same rate of speed, although there were stragglers 
from each, and when Capron halted and sent back word 
that he had come upon the Spanish outpost, the entire 
regiment closed up, halted, and most of the men sat down. 
We then, some minutes after the first word had been re- 
ceived, and before any firing had begun, received instruc- 
tions to deploy. I had my right wing partially deployed 
before the first shots between the outposts took place. 
Within less than three minutes I had G Troop, with Lle- 
wellen, Greenway, and Leahy, and one platoon of K Troop 
under Kane, on the firing-line, and it was not until after 
we reached the firing-line that the heavy volley-firing from 
the Spaniards began. 

288 



APPENDIX D 

On page 94 Mr. Bonsai says: ''A vexatious delay oc- 
curred before the two independent columns could commu- 
nicate and advance with concerted action. . . . When 
the two columns were brought into communication it was 
immediately decided to make a general attack upon the 
Spanish position. . . . With this purpose in view, the 
following disposition of the troops was made before the 
advance of the brigade all along the line was ordered." 
There was no communication between the two columns 
prior to the general attack, nor was any order issued for 
the advance of the brigade all along the line. The attacks 
were made wholly independently, and the first communi- 
cation between the columns was when the right wing of 
the Rough Riders in the course of their advance by their 
firing dislodged the Spaniards from the hill across the 
ravine to the right, and then saw the regulars come up that 
hill. 

Mr. Bonsai's account of what occurred among the regu- 
lars parallels his account of what occurred among the 
Rough Riders. He states that the squadron of the Tenth 
Cavalry delivered the main attack upon the hill, which was 
the strongest point of the Spanish position ; and he says 
of the troopers of the Tenth Cavalry that "their better 
training enabled them to render more valuable service than 
the other troops engaged." In reality, the Tenth Cavalry- 
men were deployed in support of the First, though they 
mingled with them in the assault proper; and so far as 
there was any difference at all in the amount of work done, 
it was in favor of the First. The statement that the Tenth 
Cavalry was better trained than the First, and rendered 
more valuable service, has not the slightest basis whatso- 
ever of any kind, sort, or description, in fact. The Tenth 
Cavalry did well what it was required to do ; as an organi- 

289 



APPENDIX D 

zation, in this fight, it was rather less heavily engaged, and 
suffered less loss, actually and relatively, than either the 
First Cavalry or the Rough Riders. It took about the 
same part that was taken by the left wing of the Rough 
Riders, which wing was similarly rather less heavily en- 
gaged than the right and centre of the regiment. Of 
course, this is a reflection neither on the Tenth Cavalry 
nor on the left wing of the Rough Riders. Each body 
simply did what it was ordered to do, and did it well. 
But to claim that the Tenth Cavalry did better than the 
First, or bore the most prominent part in the fight, is like 
making the same claim for the left wing of the Rough 
Riders. All the troops engaged did well, and all alike 
are entitled to share in the honor of the day. 

Mr. Bonsai out-Spaniards the Spaniards themselves as 
regards both their numbers and their loss. These points 
are discussed elsewhere. He develops for the Spanish side, 
to account for their retreat, a wholly new explanation — 
viz., that they retreated because they saw reinforcements 
arriving for the Americans. The Spaniards themselves 
make no such claim. Lieutenant Tejeiro asserts that they 
retreated because news had come of a (wholly mythical) 
American advance on Morro Castle. The Spanish official 
report simply says that the Americans were repulsed ; which 
is about as accurate a statement as the other two. All 
three explanations, those by General Rubin, by Lieutenant 
Tejeiro, and by Mr. Bonsai alike, are precisely on a par 
with the first Spanish official report of the battle of Ma- 
nila Bay, in which Admiral Dewey was described as hav- 
ing been repulsed and forced to retire. 

There are one or two minor mistakes made by Mr. Bon- 
sal. He states that on the roster of the officers of the 
Rough Riders there were ten West Pointers. There were 

290 



APPENDIX D 

three, one of whom resigned. Only two were in the fight- 
ing. He also states that after Las Guasimas Brigadier- 
General Young was made a Major-General and Colonel 
Wood a Brigadier-General, while the commanding officers 
of the First and Tenth Cavalry were ignored in this " shower 
of promotions." In the first place, the commanding offi- 
cers of the First and Tenth Cavalry were not in the fight — 
only one squadron of each having been present. In the 
next place, there was no "shower of promotions" at all. 
Nobody was promoted except General Young, save to fill the 
vacancies caused by death or by the promotion of General 
Young. Wood was not promoted because of this fight. 
General Young most deservedly was promoted. Soon after 
the fight he fell sick. The command of the brigade then 
fell upon Wood, simply because he had higher rank than 
the other two regimental commanders of the brigade ; and 
I then took command of the regiment exactly as Lieuten- 
ant-Colonels Viele and Baldwin had already taken com- 
mand of the First and Tenth Cavalry when their superior 
officers were put in charge of brigades. After the San 
Juan fighting, in which Wood commanded a brigade, he 
was made a Brigadier-General and I was then promoted 
to the nominal command of the regiment, which I was 
already commanding in reality. 

Mr. Bonsai's claim of superior efficiency for the colored 
regular regiments as compared with the white regular regi- 
ments does not merit discussion. He asserts that General 
Wheeler brought on the Guasimas fight in defiance of 
orders. Lieutenant Miley, in his book, " In Cuba with 
Shafter," on page 83, shows that General Wheeler made 
his fight before receiving the order which it is claimed he 
disobeyed. General Wheeler was in command a.shore ; he 
was told to get in touch with the enemy, and, being a man 

291 



APPENDIX D 

with the "fighting edge," this meant that he was certain 
to fight. No general who was worth his salt would have 
failed to fight under such conditions ; the only question 
would be as to how the fight was to be made. War means 
fighting; and the soldier's cardinal sin is timidity. 

General Wheeler remained throughout steadfast against 
any retreat from before Santiago. But the merit of keep- 
ing the army before Santiago, without withdrawal, until 
the city fell, belongs to the authorities at Washington, who 
at this all-important stage of the operations showed to 
marked advantage in overruling the proposals made by the 
highest generals in the field looking toward partial retreat 
or toward the abandonment of the effort to take the city. 

The following note, written by Sergeant E. G. Norton, 
of B Troop, refers to the death of his brother, Oliver B. 
Norton, one of the most gallant and soldierly men in the 
regiment : 

On July ist I, together with Sergeant Campbell and 
Troopers Bardshar and Dudley Dean and my brother who 
was killed and some others, was at the front of the column 
right behind you. We moved forward, following you as 
you rode, to where we came upon the troopers of the 
Ninth Cavalry and a part of the First lying down. I 
heard the conversation between you and one or two of the 
officers of the Ninth Cavalry. You ordered a charge, 
and the regular officers answered that they had no orders 
to move ahead; whereupon you said: "Then let us 
through," and marched forward through the lines, our 
regiment following. The men of the Ninth and First 
Cavalry then jumped up and came forward with us. Then 
you waved your hat and gave the command to charge and 
we went up the hill. On the top of Kettle Hill my 
brother, Oliver B. Norton, was shot through the head and 
in the right wrist. It was just as you started to lead the 

292 



APPENDIX D 

charge on the San Juan hills ahead of us ; we saw that the 
regiment did not know you had gone and were not follow- 
ing, and my brother said, " For God's sake follow the 
Colonel," and as he rose the bullet went through his 
head. 

In reference to Mr. Bonsai's account of the Guasimas 
fight, Mr. Richard Harding Davis writes me as follows : 

We had already halted several times to give the men a 
chance to rest, and when we halted for the last time I 
thought it was for this same purpose, and began taking 
pliotographs of the men of L Troop, who were so near 
tliat they asked me to be sure and save them a photograph. 
Wood had twice disai)peared down the trail beyond them 
and returned. As he came back for the second time I 
remember that you walked up to him (we were all dis- 
mounted then), and saluted and said: "Colonel, Doctor 
La Motte reports that the pace is too fast for the men, and 
that over fifty have fallen out from exhaustion." Wood 
replied shari)ly : "I have no time to bother with sick men 
now." You replied, more in answer, I suppose, to his 
tone than to his words : "I merely repeated what the Sur- 
geon reported to me." Wood then turned and said in 
explanation : "I have no time for them now ; I mean that 
we are in sight of the enemy." 

This was the only information we received that the men 
of L Troop had been ambushed by the Spaniards, and, if 
they were, they were very calm about it, and I certainly 
was taking photographs of them at the time, and the rest 
of the regiment, instead of being half an hour's march away, 
was seated comfortably along the trail not twenty feet dis- 
tant from the men of L Troop. You deployed G Troop 
under Captain Llewellen into the jungle at the right and 
sent K Troop after it, and Wood ordered Troops E and F 
into the field on our left. It must have been from ten to 
fifteen minutes after Capron and Wood had located the 
Spaniards before either side fired a shot. When the firing 
did come I went over to you and joined G Troop and a 

293 



APPENDIX D 

detachment of K Troop under Woodbury Kane, and we 
located more of the enemy on a ridge. 

If it is to be ambushed when you find the enemy 
exactly where you went to find him, and your scouts see 
him soon enough to give you sufficient time to spread five 
troops in skirmish order to attack him, and you then drive 
him back out of three positions for a mile and a half, then 
most certainly, as Bonsai says, "L Troop of the Rough 
Riders was ambushed by the Spaniards on the morning of 
June 24th." 

General Wood also writes me at length about Mr. Bon- 
sal's book, stating that his account of the Guasimas fight 
is without foundation in fact. He says: " We had five 
troops completely deployed before the first shot was fired. 
Captain Capron was not wounded until the fight had been 
going on fully thirty-five minutes. The statement that 
Captain Capron's troop was ambushed is absolutely un- 
true. We had been informed, as you know, by Castillo's 
people that we should find the dead guerilla a few hundred 
yards on the Siboney side of the Spanish lines." 

He then alludes to the waving of the guidon by K 
Troop as " the only means of communication with the 
regulars." He mentions that his orders did not come 
from General Wheeler, and that he had no instructions 
from General Wheeler directly or indirectly at any time 
previous to the fight. 

General Wood does not think that I give quite enough 
credit to the Rough Riders as compared to the regulars in 
this Guasimas fight, and believes that I greatly underesti- 
mate the Spanish force and loss, and that Lieutenant Te- 
jeiro is not to be trusted at all on these points. He states 
that we began the fight ten minutes before the regulars, 
and that the main attack was made and decided by us. 
This was the view that I and all the rest of us in the regi- 

294 



APPENDIX D 

ment took at the time ; but as I had found since that the 
members of the First and Tenth Regular Regiments held 
with equal sincerity the view that the main part was taken 
by their own commands, I have come to the conclusion 
that the way I have described the action is substantially 
correct. Owing to the fact that the Tenth Cavalry, which 
was originally in support, moved forward until it got 
mixed with the First, it is very difficult to get the exact 
relative position of the different troops of the First and 
Tenth in making the advance. Beck and Galbraith were 
on the left ; apparently Wainwright was farthest over on 
the right. General Wood states that Leonardo Ros, the 
Civil Governor of Santiago at the time of the surrender, 
told him that the Spanish force at Guasimas consisted of 
not less than 2,600 men, and that there were nearly 300 
of them killed and wounded. I do not myself see how it 
was possible for us, as we were the attacking party and 
were advancing against superior numbers well sheltered, 
to inflict five times as much damage as we received ; but 
as we buried eleven dead Spaniards, and as they carried off 
some of their dead, I believe the loss to have been very 
much heavier than Lieutenant Tejeiro reports. 

General Wood believes that in following Lieutenant 
Tejeiro I have greatly underestimated the number of 
Spanish troops who were defending Santiago on July ist, 
and here I think he completely makes out his case, he 
taking the view that Lieutenant Tejeiro's statements Avere 
made for the purpose of saving Spanish honor. On this 
point his letter runs as follows : 

A word in regard to the number of troops in Santiago. 
I have had, during my long association here, a good many 
opportunities to get information which you have not got 

295 



APPENDIX D 

and probably never will get ; that is, information from 
parties who were actually in the fight, who are now resi- 
dents of the city ; also information which came to me as 
commanding officer of the city directly after the surrender. 
To sum up briefly as follows : The Spanish surrendered 
in Santiago 12,000 men. We shipped from Santiago some- 
thing over 14,000 men. The 2,000 additional were troops 
that came in from San Luis, Songo, and small up-country 
posts. The 12,000 in the city, minus the force of General 
Iscario, 3,300 infantry and 680 cavalry, or in round num- 
bers 4,000 men (who entered the city just after the battles 
of San Juan and El Caney), leaves 8,000 regulars, plus the 
dead, plus Cervera's marines and blue-jackets, which he 
himself admits landing in the neighborhood of 1,200 (and 
reports here are that he landed 1,380), and plus the Span- 
ish Volunteer Battalion, which was between 800 and 900 
men (this statement I have from the lieutenant-colonel of 
this very battalion), gives us in round numbers, present for 
duty on the morning of July ist,not less than 10,500 men. 
These men were distributed 890 at Caney, two companies 
of artillery at Morro, one at Socapa, and half a company at 
Puenta Gorda ; in all, not over 500 or 600 men, but for 
the sake of argument we can say a thousand. In round 
numbers, then, we had immediately about the city 8,500 
troops. These were scattered from the cemetery around to 
Aguadores. In front of us, actually in the trenches, there 
could not by any possible method of figuring have been less 
than 6,000 men. You can twist it any way you want to; 
the figures I have given you are absolutely correct, at least 
they are absolutely on the side of safety. 

It is difficult for me to withstand the temptation to tell 
what has befallen some of my men since the regiment dis- 
banded ; how McGinty, after spending some weeks in 
Roosevelt Hospital in New York with an attack of fever, 
determined to call upon his captain, Woodbury Kane, 
when he got out, and procuring a horse rode until he found 
Kane's house, when he hitched the horse to a lamp-post and 

296 



APPENDIX D 

strolled in ; how Cherokee Bill married a wife in Hoboken, 
and as that pleasant city ultimately proved an uncongenial 
field for his activities, how I had to send both himself and 
his wife out to the Territory; how Happy Jack, haunted 
by visions of the social methods obtaining in the best sa- 
loons of Arizona, applied for the position of " bouncer 
out" at the Executive Chamber when I was elected Gov- 
ernor, and how I got him a job at railroading instead, and 
finally had to ship him back to his own Territory also ; how 
a valued friend from a cow ranch in the remote West ac- 
cepted a pressing invitation to spend a few days at the 
home of another ex-trooper, a New Yorker of fastidious in- 
stincts, and arrived with an umbrella as his only baggage; 
how poor Holderman and Pollock both died and were 
buried with military honors, all of Pollock's tribesmen com- 
ing to the burial ; how Tom Isbell joined Buffalo Bill's 
Wild West Show, and how, on the other hand, George 
Rowland scornfully refused to remain in the East at all, 
writing to a gallant young New Yorker who had been his 
bunkie : "Well, old boy, I am glad I didnt go home 
with you for them people to look at, because I aint a Buf- 
falo or a rhinoceros or a giraffe, and I dont like to be 
Stared at, and you know we didnt do no hard fighting 
down there. I have been in closer places than that right 
here in Yunited States, that is Better men to fight than 
them dam Spaniards." In another letter Rowland tells of 
the fate of Tom Darnell, the rider, he who rode the sorrel 
horse of the Third Cavalry: "There aint much news to 
write of except poor old Tom Darnell got killed about a 
month ago. Tom and another fellow had a fight and he 
shot Tom through the heart and Tom was dead when he 
hit the floor. Tom was sure a good old boy, and I sure 
hated to hear of him going, and he had plenty of grit too. 

297 



APPENDIX D 

No man ever called on him for a fight that he didn't get 
it." 

My men were children of the dragon's blood, and if 
they had no outland foe to fight and no outlet for their 
vigorous and daring energy, there was always the chance 
of their fighting one another : but the great majority, if 
given the chance to do hard or dangerous work, availed 
themselves of it with the utmost eagerness, and though 
fever sickened and weakened them so that many died from 
it during the few months following their return, yet, as a 
whole, they are now doing fairly well. A few have shot 
other men or been shot themselves ; a few ran for office 
and got elected, like Llewellen and Luna in New Mexico, 
or defeated, like Brodie and Wilcox in Arizona; some 
have been trying hard to get to the Philippines ; some have 
returned to college, or to the law, or the factory, or the 
counting-room ; most of them have gone back to the mine, 
the ranch, and the hunting camp ; and the great majority 
have taken up the threads of their Kves where they dropped 
them when the Maine was blown up and the country called 
to arms. 



208 



I D A., 'nF^ 



